USTUS  -MILES 
FOR  MAN 


THE  LIBRARY 

OF 

THE  UNIVERSITY 
OF  CALIFORNIA 

LOS  ANGELES 


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BT 


JUSTUS    MILES    FORMAN 

AUTHOR  OF 

"BUCHANAN'S  WIFE" 

"  THE  ISLAND  OF  ENCHANTMENT  " 


NEW    YORK    AND    LONDON 
HARPER   &    BROTHERS    PUBLISHERS 

M  CMVI  I 


Copyright,  1907,  by  HARPER  &  BROTHERS. 

sill  rights  reserved. 
Published  July,  1907. 


s 


TO 

HOPE" 


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CHAPTER  I 

A  NEAT  and  somewhat  acetic  -  looking  elderly 
gentleman,  tightly  buttoned  into  that  sort 
of  long  frock-coat  which  is  worn  by  acetic-looking 
elderly  gentlemen,  and  crowned  by  that  sort  of  top- 
hat  which  accompanies  such  a  coat,  stepped  out  of 
the  open  front  door  of  the  Eagle  Hotel  and  stood 
at  the  top  of  the  half-dozen  steps  severely  regarding 
the  world  below  him.  A  lady  passing  down  Main 
Street  towards  the  bridge  bowed  and  said,  "Good- 
morning,  Robert!"  But  the  elderly  gentleman — 
albeit  of  a  fine,  old-style  courtesy  in  his  normal 
moments — looked  through  and  beyond  her  and 
paid  her  no  heed.  After  a  moment  he  beat  loudly 
upon  the  boards  of  the  high  porch  with  a  gold- 
headed  stick  which  he  carried,  and  a  young  lad 
without  jacket,  and  touselled  of  hair,  dashed  forth 
to  his  bidding. 

"  Attend  me!"  said  the  elderly  gentleman  haught 
ily,  and  out-thrust  an  imperious  left  arm.  The  lad 
with  both  hands  seized  upon  this  member,  and  the 
two — something  inexpressibly  regal  and  majestic 


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in  their  action — made  a  slow  descent  of  the  half- 
dozen  steps  to  the  flag-stoned  pavement  below. 

The  elderly  gentleman  withdrew  his  arm. 

"You  may  go,  Hezekiah,"  he  said,  and  when  the 
shock-headed  lad  had  retreated  to  those  inner  fast 
nesses  whence  he  had  come,  continued  with  a 
severe,  almost  indignant  eye,  to  regard  the  world 
before  him.  From  the  near-by  foot  of  Main  Street 
arose  a  faint,  reverberating  rumble  which  became 
increasingly  thunderous — a  wagon  crossing  the 
bridge.  The  elderly  gentleman  looked  up  to  the 
blue  sky. 

"Ah,  it  is  coming  on  to  rain!"  he  observed,  and 
taking  the  gold-headed  stick  in  both  hands  attempt 
ed  to  raise  it,  under  the  misapprehension  that  it 
was  an  umbrella.  He  frowned  when  the  stick 
resisted  his  efforts,  but  after  a  moment  forgot  what 
he  had  meant  to  do  and  set  the  thing  aside,  where  it 
stood  leaning  up  against  the  hotel-porch  until  later 
on  the  shock-headed  youth  came  out  and  severed  it. 

The  elderly  gentleman  clasped  his  hands  to 
gether  under  the  tails  of  the  long,  black  coat  and 
turned  up  Main  Street.  He  walked  a  little  bent  at 
the  shoulders,  and  his  somewhat  protruding  eyes, 
of  a  singularly  pale  blue,  were  fixed  upon  the  pave 
ment  a  few  paces  before  him.  The  village  folk 
stood  out  of  his  way.  He  passed  Medical  Hall 
and  Johnstone's  tonsorial  parlors,  and  necks 
craned  in  the  windows  to  watch  him  go.  He  passed 
Mulcahy's  market,  and  that  sunny  Celt  was  for 
pressing  forward  from  the  doorway  to  accost  him 


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upon  a  matter  of  trifling  business,  but  another 
twitched  him  back,  saying: 

"Whisht,  man,  don't  ye  see  his  hands  be  undher 
his  coat-tails?" 

He  passed  Radnor's  real-estate  office  and  pres 
ently  the  Croydon  bank  —  of  which,  by-the-way, 
he  was  proprietor,  though  for  that  matter  he  was 
proprietor  of  a  good  part  of  the  village — and  in  the 
window  of  the  bank  bobbed  up  suddenly,  like  some 
preposterous  toy  worked  by  a  spring,  a  bald  little 
man  with  a  lofty  brow  where  wrinkled  age  had 
come  before  its  time.  He  passed  Squire  Martin's 
feed-store,  and  the  Martin  heir,  a  doleful  youth  of 
the  cigarettish  period,  called  out  to  his  sire: 

"There  goes  Robert  Henley  up  Main  Street!" 
Martin  pbre  rose  from  his  ledger  and  came  forward 
to  the  window. 

"Air  his  hands  under  his  cut- tails,  Howey?"  he 
inquired  with  real  interest. 

"They  be,"  said  Martin  fils,  lighting  a  Sweet 
Caporal. 

The  elder  man  chuckled.  "Then  it  must  be 
Wednesday  and  Robgrt  is  tight,"  he  concluded. 
He  peered  out  of  the  window  with  watery,  short 
sighted  eyes. 

"Yes,  there  he  goes.  Verree  tight  —  verree 
tight!  Rum  is  a  terrabul  thing,  Howey.  It  biteth 
like  a  serpent." 

"Robert  Henley  don't  drink  rum,"  said  the 
younger  man  practically.  "He  drinks  brandy. 
They  keep  his  own  kind  for  him  at  the  Eagle.  It's 

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forren."  But  Martin  p&re  wagged  an  admonitory 
head  as  he  turned  back  to  his  ledger. 

"  It's  all  the  same,  Howey,"  said  he.  "  It  biteth 
like  a  serpent.  Yew  let  it  alone.  Yew  hear 
me?" 

"I  got  to  let  it  alone,"  said  Howey.  with  a  faint 
touch  of  irritation.  "They  won't  sell  that  brandy 
to  no  one  but  him  at  the  Eagle.  They  call  it  his 
brandy.  I  don't  see  why  he  can't  get  drunk  at 
home.  He's  all  alone  there — no  one  to  bother  him. 
I  don't  see  what  he  wants  to  go  to  the  Eagle  to  do 
it  for." 

The  elder  man  looked  up  from  his  book. 

"There's  some  says  Robert  never  takes  a  drink 
to  home,"  he  declared.  "I  don't  believe  it.  It 
don't  sound  reasonabul,  but  there's  them  that  says 
so.  Yew  better  ask  him!"  He  emitted  a  toothless 
and  silent  laugh,  and  the  boy  turned  back  from  the 
window. 

But  Robert  Henley,  his  hands  under  his  coat-tails 
(by  which  mystic  sign  the  world  knew  him  to  be 
"tight"),  his  shoulders  a  little  bent,  his  pale,  pro 
truding  eyes  upon  the  flag-stones  before  his  feet, 
went  on  his  deliberate  way  past  the  post-office, 
past  the  white-spired  Methodist  Church  on  its  cor 
ner,  and  so,  above  the  little  huddle  of  the  village's 
commercial  activity,  came  under  the  great  triple- 
arched  vault  of  the  maples,  came  into  the  still  and 
green  and  odorous  peace  of  West  Main  Street,  where 
the  heat  of  the  sun  was  altogether  withheld,  where 
a  little,  vagrant  breeze,  cool  and  odorous  of  all  the 

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sweet  live  things  of  summer  bore  down  from 
Howard's  Hill  at  the  street's  far  top. 

God  made  Main  Street  in  a  happy  mood.  He 
made  it  Gothic,  as  all  proper  village  streets — and 
all  proper  churches — should  be;  a  towering  arch  of 
maples  for  roadway  and  two  side-aisles  of  lesser 
height  for  those  who  walked.  He  paved  the  road 
with  indifferent  macadam  and  guttered  it  with 
cobbles.  He  laid  no  immaculate  expanse  of  city 
concrete  or  asphalt  in  the  footway  to  insult  good 
village  boots,  but  spread  therein  reddish  flag-stones 
with  little  hollows  and  veins  where  water  stood 
after  a  rain,  and  in  the  cracks  between  the  flag 
stones.  He  made  the  green  moss  to  grow.  How 
many  little  lads  in  Croydon  town  have  been  set  to 
digging  moss  out  of  the  cracks  in  the  flag-stones 
with  a  broken  kitchen-knife  ?  How  many,  I  wonder  ? 

Inward  from  these  long  side-aisles  that  God 
made  stood  four  square  houses,  white  with  green 
shutters,  squat,  comfortable  houses  that  sheltered 
comfortable  folk.  There  were  deep  lawns  before 
them  set  with  syringas  and  lilacs  and  snow-balls 
and  two  Christmas-trees,  and  behind,  a  garden, 
deeper  yet,  filled  with  all  manner  of  delightful 
things;  behind  that  still,  an  orchard  where  escaped 
barn-yard  fowl  pecked  at  the  cider-apples  which 
lay  about  on  the  black  green  mould.  Oh,  Croydon 
was  a  good  place  to  be! — a  still,  sweet  place  of  clean 
odors  and  peace  and  quiet.  And  Main  Street 
(that  God  made  Gothic)  was  the  heart  of  it. 

Old  Robert  Henley,  with  his  hands  under  his 

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coat-tails,  went  up  through  the  sweet  summer 
morning  and  came  at  last  to  a  house  very  different 
to  those  others  of  modest  white  and  green — a 
mansion  this  of  bricks  and  stucco;  of  towers  and 
Mansard  roofs  whereon  were  spiky  iron  railings; 
of  plate-glass  windows  and  a  porte-cochere.  It  sat 
back  from  the  street  among  shrubbery  and  exotic 
trees  and  little,  self-conscious  mountain-ashes  with 
red  fruit.  There  was,  as  all  along  the  street,  a 
fence  before  the  front  lawn,  but  this  fence  was  of  an 
austere  magnificence  like  the  house — iron  painted 
and  sanded  to  look  like  stone;  a  very  swaggering 
fence. 

The  old  gentleman  pushed  open  the  gate  and 
made  slowly  to  enter  it.  It  swung  back  and  hit 
him  in  the  knees,  whereat  he  cursed  it  mildly, 
and  then,  instead  of  going  in,  turned  his  head  to 
look  up  the  street  where  two  young  people  were 
approaching,  paused  and  leaned  upon  the  gate-post 
to  wait. 

The  two  people  were  a  tall  and  lean  young  man 
neither  handsome  nor  ugly  but  something  very 
much  better  than  either  of  these,  and  a  girl  so  very 
beautiful  that  even  the  village  people  who  had 
trotted  her  on  their  knees  were  used  to  turning  in 
the  street  to  look  after  her. 

The  young  man  gave  one  look  at  Robert  Henley, 
and  then  spoke  to  the  girl  in  a  low  tone,  and  the 
two  made  as  if  to  pass  by  with  only  a  pleasant  greet 
ing.  But  old  Robert,  swaying  on  his  feet,  said: 

"One  moment,  David!"  and  the  two  stopped. 

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He  wheeled  slowly  about,  his  back  against  the  gate 
post  as  if  for  support,  and  he  withdrew  one  uncertain 
hand  from  under  the  coat-tails  and  dragged  the 
queer  tall  hat  from  his  gray  head.  Then  he  swept 
a  bow  of  exceeding  courtliness  —  the  very  father 
and  mother  of  all  courtly  bows — and  recovered 
from  it  by  some  miracle  beyond  the  understanding 
of  man.  He  said  to  the  girl: 

"I  ask  your  pardon,  my  dear,  for  a  very  great 
rudeness."  There  was  not  a  sign  of  intoxication  in 
his  tone  or  pronunciation,  but  the  pale,  protruding 
eyes  wavered  and  strayed.  "  I  must  take  this  op 
portunity,"  he  said,  "to  speak  to  David.  David, 
you  will  dine  with  me  this  evening?" 

The  young  man  flushed  slightly. 

"  Why,"  said  he — "  why,  as  a  matter  of  fact — yes, 
of  course,  Uncle  Robert,  if  it  is  something  special. 
I  had  thought  of — yes,  of  course,  I  shall  be  glad  to 
come." 

"I  thank  you,  David,"  said  old  Robert.  "It  is 
something  special.  A  matter  of  business.  I  shall 
expect  you  at  eight."  He  bowed  again  to  the  girl. 
"You  will  forgive  me,  my  dear?"  he  said.  "A 
matter  of  business.  I  only  regret  that  nowadays 
I  do  not  entertain.  Otherwise — yes,  thank  you! 
I  bid  you  good-day." 

The  girl  did  not  answer,  but  only  looked  at  him 
— a  sweet,  still  look  with  sorrow  and  pity  in  it,  not 
disgust,  and  old  Robert's  pale  eyes  turned  away. 

Then  when  the  two  had  bowed  and  gone  on  he 
stood  against  his  gate-post  and  watched  them  go 

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till  they  were  far  down  the  street  and  out  of  his 
sight. 

"Eh!"  said  old  Robert  Henley,  nodding  his  gray 
head.  "  Eh,  a  queen  there — a  very  queen!  I  must 
save  the  lad  in  time — save  him  in  time.  That 
young  queen  yonder  will  drag  him  up  to  her  throne 
and  crush  him  under  a  crown  and  smother  him  in  an 
ermine  robe.  I  must  save  him  from  that. " 

Which  may  seem  a  rather  flowery  speech  for  a 
drunken  old  reprobate,  but  Robert  was  wont  to 
put  things  quaintly.  He  lived  much  with  his 
books,  did  Robert,  and  they  were  old-fashioned 
books  and  flowery.  We  don't  read  them  now. 

He  pushed  open  the  swinging  gate  once  more,  and, 
this  time  making  a  safe  passage,  went  through  it 
and  up  the  narrow  walk  between  clumps  of  lilac 
to  the  house.  An  ancient  negro  man,  in  a  high- 
collared  coat  with  buttons,  who  had  seen  him  ap 
proaching,  held  the  great  front  door  open  to  give 
him  entrance,  and  old  Robert  passed  into  the  cool 
shaded  dimness  of  his  stately  hall.  He  gave  his  hat 
to  the  man  and  started  towards  the  stairs  which 
wound  upward  from  the  rear  of  the  hall  into  seem 
ingly  impenetrable  gloom,  but  half-way  he  paused, 
and,  after  a  moment,  turned  back.  He  gave  his 
shoulders  a  little  shake  and  straightened  his  back. 

"William,"  he  said  to  the  ancient  negro  man, 
frowning  upon  him  fiercely  —  "William,  am  I 
drunk?" 

The  old  servant  rolled  protesting  eyes. 

"Noo,  sah!"  he  said,  with  feeling.  "No,  Marse 
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Robbut.  You  suttenly  is  not  drunk  dis  time. 
No,  suh!" 

"Nobody  would  think  I  had  been  drinking, 
William?"  demanded  old  Robert,  anxiously.  "Tell 
me  the  truth,  you  scoundrel!  Don't  you  lie  to  me, 
sir!" 

The  ancient  negro  man  raised  trembling  hands 
to  high  Heaven. 

"  I  is  tellin'  you  de  truf,  Marse  Robbut,"  he  said, 
emotionally.  "Befo'  Gawd,  I  is.  You  suttenly 
has  not  be'n  a-drinkin'  to-day.  Not  dis  hyah 
time,  suh." 

"You  may  go,  William,"  said  Robert  Henley, 
and  the  old  man  shuffled  away  to  take  refuge  in 
his  pantry,  where  he  shook  a  melancholy  head, 
saying : 

"/  ain'  a-gwine  fo'  to  tell  'im  dat  he's  drunk.  / 
ain'  a-gwine  to.  Gawd  A'mighty,  ain'  he  ax  me 
that  same  question  every  week  fo'  twen'y  yeahs? 
An'  ain'  I  lie  every  time?  /  ain'  a-gwine  tell  'im." 

But  Robert  Henley,  left  alone  in  the  hall,  went 
quickly  to  a  pair  of  closed  sliding-doors  at  one  side 
and  opened  them.  He  passed  through  into  a  great 
room  where  twilight  was,  and  where  the  furniture 
stood  about  sheeted  like  tombstones  in  a  church 
yard.  He  crossed  to  one  of  the  long  south  windows 
and  let  the  blind  up.  The  thing  ran  up  with  a 
whirling  clack,  and,  since  there  was  no  shutter  out 
side,  a  square  of  golden,  living  sunlight  slanted  into 
the  dim  place  and  fell  upon  one  wall,  where,  over  a 
heavy  table  of  malachite  and  brass,  set  with  old- 


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time  ornaments,  hung  a  Gothic  frame  with  closed 
doors — an  ancient  frame,  Italian  of  make,  with  its 
gold  dull  from  great  age,  and  cracked  or  scaled  off 
in  spots. 

Old  Robert  took  a  long  breath,  and  once  more 
straightened  his  bent  shoulders.  He  put  out  an  un 
steady  hand  to  the  doors  of  the  Gothic  frame  and 
pulled  them  open.  The  inside  panels  of  the  doors 
were  painted  with  groups  of  angels  and  of  saints 
and  holy  men,  but  the  centre  panel  of  the  frame, 
where  should  have  been  a  Virgin  and  Child,  bore 
a  woman's  figure  in  the  quaint  dress  of  the  early 
seventies.  The  woman  leaned  forward  from  the 
ancient  frame  and  smiled — a  sweet  young  smile 
that  was  brave  and  trusting  and  very  beautiful. 
She  stirred  a  little  to  old  Robert's  eyes,  and  the 
smile  deepened.  The  man  gave  a  single  dry  sob. 

"I'll  save  him,  Patty,"  he  said,  nodding.  "I'll 
save  him.  I'll  send  him  away."  The  doors  of  the 
Gothic  frame  swung  to  of  their  own  weight,  and 
the  man  staggered  across  to  the  sunlit  window,  and, 
with  many  trials,  dragged  down  the  blind.  The 
fierce  hold  he  had  been  keeping  upon  himself  seemed 
quite  suddenly  to  have  slipped  away  and  he  was 
very  drunk.  He  fell  over  two  of  the  tombstones 
on  his  way  out  of  the  room. 

He  went,  swaying  in  his  walk,  down  the  long 
hall  and  entered  another  room  on  the  opposite  side 
of  the  house.  There  were  no  tombstones  here,  but 
a  pleasant,  quiet  air  of  occupancy.  The  place 
smelled  of  leather,  for  the  walls  were  lined  high 

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with  books,  and,  faintly,  of  something  else  dim  and 
elusive,  a  very  pallid  ghost  of  an  odor.  You  needed 
some  moments  before  deciding  that  it  was  sandal- 
wood. 

On  the  high  marble  mantel,  before  a  great  old 
mirror  of  French  bronze,  gilded,  stood  a  receptacle 
of  jade  magnificently  carved  in  low  relief  with  the 
imperial  five-clawed  dragon,  and,  in.  medallions  on 
the  sides  and  top,  with  the  character  Show,  which 
means  longevity.  The  thing  had  been  fashioned 
for  an  incense  burner,  but  old  Robert,  to  whom  it 
had  been  given  by  a  friend  of  his  youth,  when  jade 
was  rare  in  America,  kept  in  it  a  ball  of  cotton 
welted  with  sandal-wood  oil.  And  that  is  what 
filled  the  great  room  with  the  dim  shadow  of  the 
odor  of  incense,  which  blended  with  the  good  smell 
of  leather  bindings.  Few  men  and  no  women  ever 
entered  this  room,  but  those  who  had  been  there 
remembered  it  by  its  faint,  unusual  odor,  and  won 
dered  what  that  odor  was. 

The  man  dropped  down  into  a  stuffed  chair 
before  the  big  table  in  the  centre  of  the  room,  and 
his  hands  clawed  aimlessly  among  the  books  and 
papers  and  writing  things  that  were  there.  A  vol 
ume  of  Anacreon  lay  uppermost,  held  open  at  the 
Thirty-fifth  Ode  by  a  heavy  paper-knife,  and  beside 
it,  opened  at  the  same  place,  Moore's  metrical  trans 
lation.  Old  Robert  was,  in  his  odd  moments,  im 
proving  upon  Moore — which  does  not  sound  a  diffi 
cult  feat  until  you  have  tried  it. 

'"Ah,  mother!'"  declaimed  the  old  gentleman, 
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blinking  a  groggy  eye.  " '  I  am  wounded  through — 
I  die  with  pain — in  sooth  I  do!'" 

'"In  sooth '  be  damned!"  cried  old  Robert,  scorn 
fully.  ' ' '  In  sooth  I  do !  '—what's  the  Greek  ? "  He 
dragged  the  volume  nearer  to  his  peering  eyes,  and 
the  paper-knife  slipped  to  the  floor,  allowing  the 
book  to  close  with  a  snap  almost  upon  his  nose. 
Robert  cursed  it  and  dropped  back  in  his  chair. 

" ' In  sooth  I  do!'"  he  said,  in  a  sort  of  rumble  of 
resentment,  and  sat  for  a  long  time  staring  across 
the  room  to  where  the  works  of  sundry  French  gen 
tlemen  of  the  eighteenth  century  sat  neatly  and 
somewhat  ponderously  a-row  in  dark  red  leather ; 
but  it  is  to  be  imagined  that  he  did  not  see  them, 
for  at  times  he  muttered  and  mumbled  under  his 
breath,  and  while  his  mumblings  had  small  con 
tinuity  and  less  interest,  they  certainly  had  nothing 
to  do  with  any  period  of  French  literature.  They 
seemed  to  dwell  upon  some  "  fool  of  a  lad  "  who,  it 
appeared,  was  in  need  of  salvation. 

But  after  an  hour  of  this  he  rose  to  his  feet  and 
moved  restlessly  about  the  room.  There  were  long 
windows  at  two  sides,  north  and  west.  The  north 
window  gave  upon  a  space  of  lawn  to  the  rear  of 
the  house,  and,  beyond  that,  upon  a  garden  where 
gleamed  bright  flashes  of  scarlet  and  blue  and 
crimson  and  white  and  living  gold.  Across  the 
intervening  space  of  turf  a  large  white  Brahma  cock, 
stepping  very  high  and  proudly,  marched  at  the 
head  of  a  meek  seraglio,  and  from  time  to  time  emit 
ted  sounds  indicative  of  self-esteem. 

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Old  Robert's  pale  eyes  protruded  suddenly  be 
yond  their  ultimate  wont.  He  passed  a  hand 
across  his  worn  brow,  but  the  vision  persisted. 

"Birds!"  he  said,  in  an  awed  whisper.  "Wild 
birds  in  my  own  garden?  One  of  'em's  white! 
Mus'  be  albatross."  Robert's  intoxication  seemed 
to  be  gaining  upon  him,  or  it  had  passed  from  legs 
to  tongue,  for  he  began  to  slur  his  words,  and  that 
was  unusual  with  him. 

"Albatross!  Tha's's it! "he said, wisely.  "Thought 
albatross  was  dead.  Thought  Colebridge  killed  'em. 
— He  said  so. — Coleridge  's  a  liar — liar!  Where's 
my  gun?" 

He  tiptoed  with  swift  caution  across  the  room  to 
a  closet,  and,  stumbling  into  its  gloomy  depth, 
emerged  with  an  ancient  musket,  a  "fowling-piece" 
which  dated  from  his  own  far  youth.  A  powder- 
horn  and  shot-pouch  had  been  suspended  from  its 
wooden  ramrod,  but  the  old  man  in  his  awkward 
haste  dropped  these  to  the  floor,  and  the  powder 
spilled  out  over  the  carpet  in  a  black  stream.  He 
tiptoed  back  to  the  window  and  very  cautiously 
threw  it  open.  The  Brahma  cock,  heedless  of  im 
pending  doom,  swaggered  nearer,  emitting  sounds 
indicative  of  self  -  esteem.  Old  Robert  rested  the 
long  barrel  of  the  musket  on  the  window-ledge,  and 
dropped  upon  one  knee  to  sight  it.  He  remarked 
once  more,  with  some  indignation,  that  Coleridge 
was  a  liar  for  having  misled  the  world  in  respect  to 
that  albatross. 

Then  burst  forth  a  roar  which  was  heard  of  the 

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entire  village  of  Croydon.  A  nervous  old  lady  who 
lived  next  door  refused  to  go  to  sleep  for  several 
nights  thereafter. 

"Dead,  by  gad!"  said  Robert  Henley,  swelling 
with  pride.  "Dead,  by  gad!  Straight  through 
the  heart!" 

Fragments  of  the  Brahma  cock  lay  about  the 
back  lawn  and  even  in  the  far-away  garden.  It  is 
a  pleasure  to  record  that  beside  the  largest  frag 
ment  reposed,  with  her  feet  in  the  air,  one  faithful 
wife.  The  others,  alas!  had  fled  with  squawks  of 
terror  and  confusion. 

The  ancient  negro  addressed  as  William  dashed 
panic-stricken  into  his  master's  study,  eyes  rolling 
in  a  frenzy  of  fear,  mouth  agape,  lips  stammering 
in  cries  of  anguish.  Old  Robert  faced  him  from 
beside  the  open  window.  He  was  leaning  upon  the 
barrel  of  the  "fowling-piece,"  one  hand  thrust  into 
the  bosom  of  his  long  frock-coat,  one  foot  noncha 
lantly  crossed  over  the  other.  There  was  something 
about  him  vaguely  reminiscent  of  the  heroes  of  the 
late  Fenimore  Cooper.  So  "the  Pathfinder"  must 
have  stood  after  some  deed  of  more  than  common 
daring. 

"William,"  he  said,  with  dignity,  "I  have  slain 
the  albatross." 

William  emitted  unintelligible  sounds. 

"Coleridge  'z'z'z  liar!"  said  old  Robert,  darkly, 
and  again  his  tongue  began  to  slur  the  words.  He 
waved  a  majestic  hand  towards  the  window. 

"Observe — corpse!"  he  said. 
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"Fo'  Gawd's  sake,  Marse  Robbut,"  cried  the 
servant,  "what  is  you  ben  doin'  dis  hyah  time? — 
You  ain'  done  kill  no  one,  Marse  Robbut?"  He 
made  a  scuttling,  rheumatic  dash  to  the  window 
and  gazed  out  at  the  remains  of  the  white  Brahma 
cock. 

After  a  long  time  he  shook  his  white  head,  turn 
ing  back  into  the  room,  and  very  gently  led  his 
master  away.  As  they  went,  old  Robert  said : 

"I  shall  have — guest  for  dinner  to-night,  Will 
iam.  Mr.  David  Rivers — dines  with  me." 

"Den  you  ain'  gwine  down  to  de  Eagle  dis  hyah 
night,  Marse  Robbut?" 

"No,  William,"  he  said;  "not  this  night." 

"I  thank  Gawd,  Marse  Robbut,"  said  the  old 
man,  piously.  "Yassir,  I  sho'ly  thank  Gawd  fo' 
dat. — En  I  ain'  gwine  min'  'bout  dat  ole  white 
Braymey  no  mo'.  No,  even  ef  I  did  raise  'im  fo' 
de  aig.  Come,  Marse  Robbut!  Time  fo'  you  to 
res',  suh." 


CHAPTER  II 

BUT  the  two  young  people  whom  old  Robert 
had  stopped  at  his  gate  went  on  down  the  street 
together,  and  because  Croydon  has  not  very  much 
business  of  its  own  to  mind,  and  must  therefore 
mind  some  other  business,  heads  popped  up  in 
shop  -  windows  to  take  note  of  them  —  as  in  old 
Robert's  case — and  fingers  pointed  from  the  shelter 
of  more  than  one  doorway. 

There  were  young  Davie  Rivers  and  Rosemary 
Crewe  walking  together  again.  Like  as  not  they 
were  going  to  make  a  match  of  it,  and,  well,  why 
not?  Wa'n't  she  handsome  enough  for  anybody 
to  take  to? — even  young  sparks  that  had  to  go 
away  to  collidge,  and  wore  clothes  from  New  York  ? 

Uncle  Abijah  Crawford  (alias  Uncle  Crawfish), 
the  constable,  nodded  to  the  two  affably,  emerging 
from  Busch's  sample-room  with  bandanna  at  lips. 
He  said: 

"Mornin',  Davie!     Mornin',  Miss  Rosemary!" 

And  the  girl,  when  they  had  gone  on  a  few  paces, 
broke  out  with  a  certain  little  gurgle  of  glee  which 
she  out  of  all  the  world  possessed  for  her  own. 

"Oh,  Davie,  Davie,"  she  said,  "you'll  have  to 
be  more  than  a  celebrity  and  do  more  than  wear 

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beautiful  clothes  to  outgrow  that  name.  They'd 
call  you  'Da  vie'  in  Croydon,  Da  vie,  if  you  were  to 
come  back  here  with  white  hair  and  a  diploma  as 
President  of  the  United  States.  Do  Presidents  have 
diplomas  to  prove  that  they're  Presidents?  They 
must  have  something." 

David  laughed  and  looked  down  into  her  face — 
he  could  look  down  a  bit,  for  he  was  a  long  youth — 
with  that  little,  quizzical  expression  which  passes 
between  two  people  who  are  of  a  quick-compre 
hending  sympathy  and  kinship. 

"What  do  you  mean  by  celebrity?" 

"/  call  a  young  man  who  has  had  a  work  of 
fiction  accepted  by  a  great  magazine  a  celebrity," 
said  the  girl. 

"Oh,  do  you,  though!"  said  he.  "What  if  your 
celebrity  should  never  have  another  work  of  fic 
tion  accepted  by  a  magazine,  great  or  small  ?  What 
if  he  shouldn't,  eh?" 

"Oh,  but  he  will!"  she  said,  calmly.  "I'm  not 
afraid  about  my — about  this  celebrity.  He's  the 
sort  to  succeed  in  things." 

"I  wonder!"  said  David  Rivers,  looking  afar 
with  wide  eyes  gone  suddenly  grave.  "Oh,  I 
wonder!" 

"  I  don't  wonder,  Davie,"  the  girl  said ;  "  I  know." 

They  came  to  the  bridge,  with  its  great  iron  bow 
string  trusses,  which  spanned  the  little  river  con 
necting  Main  Street  with  East  Main  Street,  and 
paused  a  moment,  as  they  always  did,  to  look  down 
at  the  dam  beneath  them  and  at  the  still,  dark 

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water  above  it,  where  little  boys  fished  for  bull 
heads,  and  the  half-dry,  rock-strewn  river-bed  be 
low,  with  its  scarfs  of  up-cropping  slate. 

David  beat  his  hands  idly  upon  the  low  iron 
railing  of  the  bridge's  footway,  and  abruptly  he 
laughed. 

"Remember  the  frosty  mornings,"  he  said,  "when 
we  crossed  the  bridge  on  our  way  to  school  and 
dared  each  other  to  touch  our  tongues  to  the  iron 
railing?" 

"Oh,  cruel  Davie!"  she  said.  "Shall  I  ever  for 
get?  You  dared  me  once  too  often.  You  said  it 
wouldn't  hurt  much,  and  I  did  it,  and  there  wasn't 
any  skin  left  on  the  end  of  my  poor  little  tongue." 

"Beast!  beast  that  I  was!"  cried  David,  and  his 
eyes  grew  tender.  "And  such  a  plucky  little  dear, 
you!"  said  he.  "You  wouldn't  cry,  though  the 
pain  made  you  go  fairly  white." 

"And  so,  to  reward  me — "  she  said,  and  the 
ready  crimson  came  again  up  over  her  cheeks. 

"I  know,"  said  David.  "I  kissed  you.  Cheeky 
little  beggar!  Oh,  but  I  don't  blame  me!  I  don't 
blame  me!  Do  you?" 

She  evaded  that. 

"I  like  what  you  did  next,  Davie,"  said  she. 

"What  did  I  do?"  he  demanded.  But  he  knew 
all  the  while. 

"You  licked  the  rail,  too,"  she  said.  "Oh,  I 
think  we  were  both  dears! — such  quaint  little  dears. 
I  like  us  so,  Davie!  Why  must  we  have  grown 
up?" 

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"Some  of  us  haven't,  noticeably,"  said  David. 
"  Some  of  us  are  still  about  three,  more  than  half 
of  the  time." 

And  at  that  she  gave  her  own  little  gurgle  of  de 
light  again,  and  patted  his  arm,  looking  about  to 
make  sure  that  she  was  not  seen. 

"That's  meant  for  me,"  she  said,  "  and  it's  meant 
for  a  slur;  but  I  don't  care;  I  don't  care  if  I  am 
three  half  of  the  time.  I  glory  in  it.  I'm  rather 
a  dear  when  I'm  young.  And  if  it  comes  to  that, 
you're  not  quite  senile  yourself,  Mr.  Rivers." 

"No,"  said  Mr.  Rivers,  with  a  little  sigh,  "we've 
such  a  trick  of  being  infants  together,  Rose-Marie! 
When  you're  three  I'm  never  more  than  four.  So 
neither  of  us  can  reproach  the  other.  What  did 
we  cross  the  bridge  for?  You  said  you  had  an 
errand." 

"A  message  from  mother  to  Mrs.  Hoi  worthy," 
she  said.  "I  sha'n't  be  but  a  moment.  You  can 
wait  on  the  porch  while  I  go  in  —  unless,  that  is, 
you'd  rather  play  in  the  street  with  that  other  little 
boy.  It's  Sammy  Tows,  and  I  think  he's  making 
mud-pies." 

"He's  not,"  said  David,  indignantly.  "He's 
building  forts.  Sammy  is  a  warrior  by  nature — 
but  he's  a  little  nervous  about  dogs.  I'll  wait 
with  Sammy.  Don't  be  long!" 

They  passed  the  little  gray -stone  Episcopal 
church,  which  sat  at  the  bridge's  eastward  end, 
high-perched  on  the  precipitous  bank  of  the  lower 
river,  and  beyond  it,  at  the  corner  of  Church  Street, 

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came  to  the  Holworthy  house,  buried  among  its 
old  trees.  Sammy  Tows  rose  from  his  entrench 
ments  to  gape  at  them,  and  David,  waving  a  flag 
of  truce,  joined  him,  while  the  girl  went  about  her 
errand. 

"  I  want  your  advice  about  a  lady,  Samuel,"  said 
David  Rivers. 

Mr.  Tows  said,  "Hee!"  and  rubbed  one  bare  and 
muddy  foot  against  a  bare  and  muddy  leg,  grinning 
widely. 

"If,  Samuel,"  pursued  David  Rivers,  "you  had 
come  to  the  conclusion  that  a  certain  lady  was  the 
most  beautiful  and  most  sympathetic  and  most 
wonderful  being  alive — your  soul-mate,  as  it  were 
(do  I  make  myself  plain?)  —  what  would  you  do 
about  it?  Would  you  presume,  bare  and  grovel 
ling  as  you  felt  yourself,  wholly  unworthy,  a  mere 
beginner  at  life — in  short,  an  unlicked  cub — would 
you  presume  to  tell  her  what  you  thought  of  her 
and  ask  her  to  help  you  try  to  grow  up  to  her 
stature  ?  Would  you  beg  her  to  marry  you,  Samuel  ? ' ' 

Again  Mr.  Tows  said  "Hee!"  rubbing  one  bare 
and  muddy  foot  against  a  bare  and  muddy  leg. 

And  presently  he  said  : 

"Ah,  g'wan!" 

And  presently  again,  patting  an  astonishing  mud- 
fortress  with  a  prehensile  toe : 

"I'd  ruther  be  a  soldier  'n'  fight." 

David  regarded  him  soberly. 

"Out  of  the  mouth  of  the  infant  Samuel!"  he 
said,  after  a  long  time. 

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A    STUMBLING-BLOCK 

' ' '  Ruther  be  a  soldier  'n'  fight ! " '  he  said.  ' '  Bet 
ter  be  a  soldier  'n'  fight!  I  wonder  now — I  wonder, 
friend  Tows."' 

And  this,  it  will  be  observed,  was  the  second  time 
that  morning  that  David  had  wondered.  It  was  a 
way  he  had. 

Rosemary  came  out  of  the  Holworthy  gate  and 
found  him  staring  with  grave  eyes  at  the  embar 
rassed  Mr.  Tows,  who  stood  before  him,  stork-wise 
on  one  leg,  among  the  works  of  war. 

"What  are  you  doing,  Davie?"  she  demanded. 

"Asking  riddles  of  the  Oracle,"  said  David,  and 
turned  away  with  her.  "The  Oracle  has  given  me. 
something  to  think  over." 

She  tried  to  pump  him  about  the  mystery,  but 
David  was  evasive  and  rather  silent.  He  said  only 
"Yes"  or  "No"  to  her  as  they  went  back  across 
the  bridge  and  through  the  huddle  of  shops,  and  so 
on  under  the  great  green  vault  of  West  Main  Street. 

They  repassed  the  austerely  majestic  Henley 
mansion,  and  David  turned  his  eyes  to  its  blank 
front. 

"I  wonder,"  he  said  as  if  to  himself — "I  wonder 
what  Uncle  Robert  wants  to  see  me  about  to-night. " 
He  called  old  Robert  uncle  not  because  of  any  blood 
relationship  but  through  a  sort  of  traditional  sen 
timent.  Henley  had  been  the  closest  friend  of 
David's  father,  his  sole  trustee  after  the  latter's 
death,  and  young  David's  guardian. 

1 '  I  can't  think,  Davie, ' '  said  the  girl.  ' '  You  don't 
go  there  often  at  all,  do  you?" 

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"  Twice  each  year  I  have  dined  there,"  said  David 
—"the  evening  before  I  went  away  to  college,  in 
September,  and  the  evening  of  the  day  I  came  back, 
in  June.  It's  a  function  of  great  seriousness.  I 
shall  have  to  dress." 

" Poor  old  chap!"  he  said,  after  a  pause.  "What 
a  life  to  live!  Think  what  the  man  is — by  breed 
ing  and  education  and  taste,  Harvard  and  Oxford 
and  Heidelberg ;  a  half-dozen  years  in  England  and 
in  Paris,  and  then — a  grave  here  in  this  little  town! 
A  living  grave!  Not  one  soul  to  talk  to  about  the 
things  he  loves — the  things  he  must  love! — not  one 
possible  occupation  beyond  sitting  alone  in  his 
library  and  reading  Greek.  I  don't  wonder  he  gets 
blind  drunk  regularly  once  a  week.  I  should  be 
drunk  the  week  through." 

The  girl  looked  up  to  him  with  troubled  eyes. 

"Oh,  Davie,"  she  said,  "I'm  so  sorry  for  him! 
He's  a  bitterly  lonely  old  man,  Davie.  You  know, 
I  suppose,  they  always  say  that  it's  only  a  woman 
can  do  that  to  a  man's  life.  I  wonder  if  it  was  a 
woman  who  wrecked  Robert  Henley.  I  wonder 
who  the  woman  could  have  been?" 

"Oh!"  said  David,  in  a  questioning  surprise.  "I 
don't  know,  I'm  sure.  A  woman?  I  never  heard 
anything  of  that  sort  about  Uncle  Robert.  I 
wouldn't  have,  though,  I  expect;  it  would  have 
been  before  our  time.  He  must  be  well  over  fifty. 
A  woman!  Oh,  I  should  think  it  couldn't  be  that. 
Uncle  Robert  doesn't  seem  that  sort  at  all." 

They  came  at  length  to  the  big  square  house 
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where  Rosemary  lived  with  her  parents,  and  they 
turned  into  the  drive  —  called  for  some  obscure 
reason  the  "lane" — and,  between  rows  of  box  and 
myrtle,  passed  the  side  of  the  house,  came  out  be 
yond  the  stable  into  a  stretch  of  back  lawn,  crossed 
that,  passing  under  an  arch  heavy  with  climbing 
roses,  and  so  by  a  cinder-path  went  through  the 
sweet  garden  of  old-fashioned  flowers.  Phlox  and 
sweet-williams  stood  in  glowing  masses;  blue  lark 
spurs  brushed  their  knees  as  they  walked ;  foxglove 
and  snap-dragon  grew  in  a  tangled  riot  of  color. 
There  was  a  scent  of  mignonette  in  the  air  above 
the  scent  of  the  roses,  and  a  breath  of  heliotrope 
above  that. 

But  at  the  foot  of  the  garden  there  was  a  stretch 
of  turf  which  guarded  the  orchard  beyond.  Two 
broad  low  apple-trees  made  great  circles  of  shade 
upon  the  turf,  and  there  were  cane-chairs,  rather 
feeble  and  out  at  the  knees  and  suffering  from 
exposure.  At  one  side  there  was  a  fantastically 
gnarled  quince,  in  whose  grotesque  arms  a  sort  of 
open,  thatched  play-house  stood  high  above  the 
reach  of  overcurious  beasts  or  perchance  of  preda 
tory  bands  of  savages. 

Rosemary  sat  down  upon  the  turf  with  her  back 
against  the  trunk  of  an  apple-tree,  settling  herself, 
after  that  mysterious  way  women  have,  in  a  sort 
of  billow  of  soft  white  drapery,  and  David  dropped 
at  her  feet.  She  did  not  speak  for  a  little  time,  but 
sat  still,  with  her  hands  idle  in  her  lap,  looking  away 
over  the  tangled  garden  to  a  little  summer-house 

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that  was  there,  and  a  row  of  tall  hollyhocks  which 
bent  and  nodded  in  the  slow  breeze  against  a 
near  by  wall.  David  watched  her  in  silence, 
and  he  drew  a  little  sigh  of  sheer  content  and  of 
pure,  artistic  delight  at  the  exquisite  loveliness  of 
her. 

It  has  been  said  she  was  so  beautiful  that  people 
turned  in  the  street  to  stare  after  her,  but  that  is 
to  say  very  little  and  to  picture  her  not  at  all,  for 
there  are  many  splendidly  beautiful  women,  and 
every  one  of  them  must  attract  attention  wherever 
she  goes. 

The  girl  was  Greek  —  astonishingly  Greek  —  in 
both  head  and  figure — and,  for  that  matter,  in  soul, 
too.  She  had  the  long,  slender,  fluent  lines  of  body 
and  limb,  the  round  waist,  the  deep  chest  and  small 
bust,  the  sturdy  throat  of  those  ancient  virgins  that 
the  greatest  sculptors  of  the  world  worshipped  and 
wrought  into  imperishable  stone.  How  she  had 
come  by  this  sweet  miracle  of  grace  it  is  entirely 
impossible  to  imagine.  Her  parents  were  good 
people  of  excellent  stock,  cultured  in  a  narrow 
fashion,  thoroughly  commonplace.  Not  from  them, 
then,  this  flower  of  antiquity.  It  was  a  miracle, 
and,  seemingly,  must  rest  so. 

She  was  not  a  very  tall  girl,  but  seemed  tall.  It 
was  something  in  pose  and  movement  that  did  it. 
Vera  incessu  patuit  dea.  She  moved  slowly,  and, 
as  it  were,  sweetly;  and,  like  herself,  her  beautiful 
eyes  were  slow  to  move,  and  rested  a  long  time 
where  she  turned  them.  A  beautiful  soul  looked 

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from  Rosemary's  beautiful  eyes.     No  bodily  loveli 
ness  ever  stirred  any  one's  heart  without  that. 

But  to  catalogue  her  is  merely  to  put  word  to 
word.  It  can  give  you  no  picture.  The  girl  was  be 
yond  words.  Something  exquisite,  virginal,  breathed 
always  from  her  like  a  palpable  fragrance.  She 
went  clothed  in  an  aura  of  perpetual  sweetness 
which  language  cannot  reproduce. 

David,  prone  on  the  turf,  watched  her,  safe  in 
the  momentary  absence  of  her  attention.  Again, 
as  a  thousand  times  before,  he  set  himself  the  task 
of  cold  criticism — if  it  were  possible  coldly  to  look 
upon  Rosemary — set  himself  to  examining  every  line 
and  turn  and  contour  of  the  exquisite  head  whose 
profile  was  sharp  cut  to  him  against  the  gray-brown 
of  the  tree-trunk.  And  again,  as  always,  it  gave 
him  a  little  thrill  of  pure  delight  to  find  that  there 
was  no  littlest  thing  in  all  the  beautiful  whole  which 
he  would  have  altered  had  this  been  clay  and  he  a 
sculptor. 

Abruptly  the  girl  faced  him  and  began  a  little, 
slow  smile  when  she  found  his  eyes  upon  her. 

' '  A  penny,  David ! ' '  she  said.     ' '  A  penny ! ' ' 

"I  was  thinking,"  said  he,  "of  something  I  read 
the  other  day.  I  had  a  volume  of  Poe's  tales  on 
the  train  with  me.  He  quotes  in  'Ligeia'  some 
thing  from  Lord  Verulam,  I  think  it  is  —  about 
there  being  no  truly  exquisite  beauty  without  some 
strangeness  in  the  proportion.  And  I  was  wonder 
ing  where  the  strangeness  of  proportion  was  in 
you." 

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"Oh,  Davie,  Davie,"  she  said,  with  her  little  wail, 
"you  mustn't  always  be  thinking  about  my — my 
looks,  Davie!  I  feel  such  a  fool." 

"And,"  said  David,  unperturbed,  "I  discovered 
that  it's  the  mouth  and  chin.  You're  absolute 
pure  Greek  except  there.  The  Greek  face  —  the 
classic  ones — all  have  short,  weak  chins  and  a 
curled-over  under-lip.  You've  got  a  strong,  point 
ed  chin,  and  your  under-lip  doesn't  curl  over.  The 
upper  one  curls  up,  though! 

"And  so,"  he  said,  "you're  quite  all  right,  ac 
cording  to  Verulam,  and  that's  a  great  relief."  A 
sudden  flush  of  color  came  into  his  cheeks,  and  he 
drew  a  little,  quick  breath,  staring  up  at  her. 

"What  splendid,  golden  thing  are  you,  Rose- 
Marie?"  he  said,  in  a  sort  of  whisper.  "Where  did 
you  come  from?  Out  of  what?"  He  shook  his 
head,  staring  up  into  her  face  with  anxious  eyes, 
and  he  waved  his  free  hand  in  a  gesture  which 
seemed  to  sweep  Croydon  and  its  works  and  folk. 

"You  don't  belong  here,  you  know,"  he  said. 
"You're  not  one  of  us.  You  were  by  some  miracle 
born  here,  and  you  and  I  played  through  our  child 
hood  together,  but — I  think,  even  then —  What 
are  you,  Rose-Marie  ? 

"There's  something  about  you,"  said  David, 
frowning  over  his  futile  search  for  words,  "that 
we  haven't.  Oh,  I  don't  mean  just  beauty — some 
thing  beyond  that,  something  ancient  and  half- 
divine  and  mystical,  something  that  goddesses  had 
and  that  Helen  had  and  a  few  other  women  whom 

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men  died  for — something  eternal.  Who  have  you 
been  before,  when  the  world  was  young?" 

The  girl's  still  eyes  looked  down  at  him  gravely, 
and  then  up  over  his  head  towards  something  he 
could  not  see;  and  for  a  little  while  she  did  not 
answer. 

"I  don't  know,  Davie,"  she  said,  at  last,  unsmil 
ing.  "Some  one  else,  certainly — we  all  have  been 
that,  of  course — probably  a  great  many  people. 
Sometimes  I  see  little  glimpses  and  remember  little 
fragments  of  things,  as  every  one  does.  Oh,  I  don't 
know!  But  whoever  it  was,  she  loved  beautiful 
things  and  beautiful  thoughts,  Davie,  and  people 
trying  to  be  and  do  the  best  there  was  in  them — 
and  she  loved  love  that  was  uplifting  and  everlast 
ing.  Some  one  sweet  and  pitiful  and  true.  Oh, 
Davie,  stop,  stop,  or  I  shall  cry!  Trying  to  think 
back  makes  me  cry. 

"Talk  about  something  else,  Davie!"  she  said, 
pleading.  "Talk  about  you!  That's  much  better. 
Let's  talk  about  what  you're  going  to  do.  But  first 
show  me  the  letter  again.  I  want  to  read  it." 

"Letter?"  said  David,  with  fine  innocence. 
"What  letter?" 

"Oh,  Davie!  Davie!"  she  cried  out,  shaking  her 
head  over  him.  "Don't  pretend,  Davie!  You 
know  you  have  it  in  your  pocket.  It  wouldn't 
have  been  human  to  leave  it  at  home." 

David  had  the  decency  to  turn  a  little  red,  but 
he  made  a  fine  pretence  of  searching  through  his 
pockets  and  a  fine  pretence  of  surprise  when  at 


A    STUMBLING-BLOCK 

last  he  came  upon  it.  It  must  be  confessed  that 
the  envelope  had  a  well-worn  air  as  he  handed  it 
up  to  Rosemary. 

She  took  out  the  typed  sheet,  with  its  letter-head 
of  a  great  New  York  publishing  house,  and  read 
aloud.  The  letter  said: 

"DEAR  MR.  RIVERS, — It  gives  me  pleasure  to  inform 
you  that  your  short  story,  'The  Golden  Well,'  has  been 
accepted  for  publication  in  the  magazine.  A  voucher  in 
payment  for  the  same  will  be  forwarded  to  you  in  due 
course. 

"I  do  not  wish  to  let  pass  this  opportunity  of  saying  a 
personal  word  of  welcome,  of  congratulation,  and,  per 
haps,  of  warning.  The  half-dozen  or  more  little  tales 
which  you  have  offered  up  have  all  interested  me,  as  I 
have  already  briefly  written  to  you,  and  I  have  regretted 
that  certain  faults — faults  of  construction  or  of  other 
things  —  made  it  hitherto  impossible  to  accept  one  of 
them  for  publication.  I  think  that  in  'The  Golden  Well' 
you  have  made  an  excellent  little  romance,  but,  if  I  may 
venture  to  say  it,  a  theme  so  tenuous  could  succeed  only 
by  the  happiest  possible  treatment — which  I  am  glad  to 
add  you  have,  in  this  instance,  given  it. 

"You  are  building  up  for  yourself  a  style  of  true  charm 
and  beauty,  and  it  will  carry  you  far  if  you  are  able  to 
add  to  it— to  put,  as  it  were,  under  it,  a  solider  matter  of 
thought  than  you  have  heretofore  put  there.  Style  is, 
after  all,  but  the  dressing  of  the  feast.  The  meats  and 
vegetables  are  the  main  thing. 

"I  say  this  because  it  has  seemed  to  me  that  you  were 
somewhat  in  danger  of  deluding  yourself  into  a  false 
security  by  your  knowledge  of  the  fact  that  you  can  make 
words  flow  well  in  combination. 

"My  unsought  advice  to  you  is,  live,  travel  if  you  can, 
observe,  work,  study.  Be  very  sure  that  you  have  some- 

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thing  to  write  before  you  write  it.  You  will  never  have 
the  difficulty  that  most  writers  experience  in  saying  what 
you  have  in  your  mind. 

"I  again  congratulate  you  on  the  charming  little  tale 
which  we  are  to  publish,  and  ask  your  pardon  for  this 
long  preachment.  I  need  scarcely  add  that  it  has  come 
out  of  an  unusually  strong  and  hopeful  interest  in  a 
young  man  who  may  rise  high  if  he  sets  about  it  with 
great  care  and  pains.  Sincerely  yours, 

"JOHN  COWPER." 

"Oh,  Davie,"  the  girl  said,  after  a  bit,  "he 
must  believe  in  you  very  hard  to  have  written  that 
letter.  It's  a  wonderful  letter.  I  don't  know 
much  about  it,  Davie,  but  I'm  very  sure  that  great 
editors  aren't  in  the  habit  of  writing  letters  like 
that  to  young  men  whom  they  don't  even  know 
by  sight." 

"No,"  said  David,  folding  the  letter  to  lay  it 
back  into  his  pocket,  "I  expect  they  don't,  Rose- 
Marie.  I  expect  he  must  think  I've  got  —  some 
thing.  I'm  glad." 

' '  Glad ! ' '  she  cried.  ' '  Glad !  Davie  you  ought  to 
be  on  your  knees  saying  how  glad  you  are!"  v 

"It's  your  spurs,  Davie,"  she  said,  a  little  shyly. 
"It's  your  spurs — sort  of.  It's  a  great  man  and  a 
great  editor  welcoming  you  into  a  great  brother 
hood.  Oh,  it  means  so  much  to  me — for  you!" 

David  nodded,  looking  away. 

"  It  means  a  good  deal  to  me  too,  you  know,"  he 
said,  "only  I  can't  say  it.  Oh,  I'm  not  taking  it 
too  lightly,  never  fear ! ' ' 

And  then,  for  a  little,  neither  of  them  spoke. 
29 


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But  presently  the  girl  sat  up  straight,  away  from 
the  tree- trunk,  and  said,  in  another  tone: 

"And  now,  Davie,  what  are  you  going  to  do? 
What  are  we  going  to  do  with  you  ?  Here  you  are, 
two-and-twenty — nearly  twenty-three — done  with 
college  and  all  its  works,  ready  to  face  the  world, 
and  with  a  letter  like  that  to  help  you  in  heart,  to 
prove  to  you  that  you're  on  the  right  road,  that 
you're  not  making  any  mistake  in  choosing  your 
profession.  What  are  we  going  to  do  with  you?" 
She  smiled  down  upon  him  brightly,  and  David 
grinned  back,  laughing  a  little  at  her  swift  change 
of  mood. 

"You're  such  an  April  lady!"  he  complained. 

"Do?"  said  he.  "Do?  Why,  I  suppose,  live, 
observe,  work,  study.  Travel  I  can't,  for  I'm  too 
poor.  You  can't  travel  on  a  thousand  dollars  a 
year,  and  Uncle  Robert  would  never  let  me  cut  into 
my  principal.  He  has  the  control,  you  know,  until 
I'm  thirty.  Yes — live,  observe,  work,  study.  One 
can  do  all  those  here  in  Croydon,  can't  one  ?  Who 
wants  a  better  place  to  live  in  than  Croydon — or 
to  work  or  study  in,  for  that  matter?" 

"  I  wonder,  Davie,"  she  said,  frowning  down  upon 
him  thoughtfully — "I  wonder  if  you  ought  not  to 
be  out  among  people,  where  they're  doing  things; 
where  the  big  things  are  happening ;  where  the  big 
men  are." 

"  But  you're  here,  Rose-Marie,"  said  David — or  it 
said  itself. 

And  then  a  sort  of  strange  panic  of  shyness  and 
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of  dread  came  upon  the  boy.  He  tried  to  look  up, 
but  it  was  a  physical  impossibility,  and  he  lay, 
sprawled  upon  the  green  turf,  his  eyes  held  by 
some  power  not  within  him,  the  heart  in  his  body 
beating  so  that  he  thought  he  literally  heard  its 
sound. 

Crucial  moments  in  the  relation  of  two  people 
one  to  the  other  sometimes  come  with  appalling 
swiftness,  and  without  volition,  without  intent. 
The  two  are  talking  upon  some  ordinary  topic  in 
the  ordinary  way.  All  at  once,  a  chance  admission, 
a  careless  remark,  and  they  stand  upon  a  mountain- 
bank  in  thin,  sharp  air  apart  from  all  the  world, 
naked,  stripped  of  pretence,  staring  into  each  other's 
uncurtained  eyes,  into  each  other's  uncloaked 
hearts. 

Young  David  lay  breathless,  his  head  bent,  his 
eyes  holden,  and  a  fear  which  he  could  not  name 
or  define  gripped  him  and  shook  him  sorely.  He 
heard  Rosemary  give  a  sudden  stir  where  she  sat, 
and  heard  her  quick,  sharp  intake  of  breath,  but 
his  eyes  being  abased  he  did  not  see  that  suddenly 
her  slim  hands  began  to  tremble,  lying  in  her  lap, 
so  that  she  drew  them  away  and  hid  them  behind 
her.  He  did  not  see  Rosemary's  sweet  eyes  that 
bent  upon  him  with  a  beautiful  and  tender  yearning 
which  may  not  be  told,  since  there  are  no  words  for 
that. 

She  seemed  to  wait  for  the  space  of  a  long 
moment — telltale  hands  gripped  stiffly  behind  her, 
eyes  yearning  over  her  David,  who  would  not  look, 

<*! 


A    STUMBLING-BLOCK 

and  all  the  lovely,  wholesome  color  paling  out  of 
cheeks  and  round  throat  until  she  was  white,  white. 
It  was  a  long  moment,  but  David  lay  still  through 
it,  that  power  which  was  an  unnamed  fear  heavy 
upon  his  tongue. 

Then  Rosemary  stirred  once  more. 

"I,  Davie?"  she  said,  rather  low.  "Oh  yes,  Pm 
here.  I  shall  always  be  here,  I  suppose.  But  I 
have  nothing  to  do  with  it.  It's  you  we're  talk 
ing  of." 

Abruptly  the  weight  was  loosed  from  David's 
tongue,  a  flush  ran  hotly  up  to  his  eyes. 

"You've  everything  to  do  with  it!"  cried  he; 
"everything!"  But  the  moment  was  past.  Rose 
mary  shook  her  beautiful  head,  smiling  a  little,  pale 
smile.  She  was  stubborn,  in  a  most  exasperating 
fashion,  at  times.  And  David  saw  this  for  one  of 
the  times. 

"No  apron-strings,  Davie  dear!"  said  she.  Even 
then  there  was  a  cloudy,  wistful  trouble  in  her  great 
eyes,  something  that  besought  and  was  in  pain,  but 
David,  staring  miserably  into  it,  was  helpless.  The 
mystic  moment  was  gone  beyond  recall. 

"No  apron-strings!"  she  said  again.  "You  have 
a  career  before  you,  work  to  do,  a  long,  long  battle 
to  fight.  I  wonder  if  you  wouldn't  be  wise  to  go 
where  the  battle's  thickest?  I  wonder  if  you're 
wise  to  stay  here  out  of  the  press." 

A  silvery  bell  rang  from  up  at  the  top  of  the 
flower-garden. 

"Oh,  dear!"  said  the  girl.  "There's  luncheon. 
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A    STUMBLING-BLOCK 

I  must  go.  I  had  no  idea  it  was  so  late,  Davie. 
You're  very  absorbing.  I  must  go." 

David  got  to  his  feet  and  would  have  put  out 
his  hands  to  raise  her,  but  she  seemed  not  to  need 
them.  They  went  up  through  the  garden  together, 
and  David  left  her  at  the  end  of  a  little  arborlike 
pleached  walk  which  led  to  a  side  door  of  the 
house.  She  stood  slim  and  straight  and  beautiful, 
very  Greek  in  that  moment,  under  the  twilight  of 
the  close-grown  arbor.  She  lifted  her  eyes  to  David, 
and  it  seemed  to  him  that,  as  the  Hindoo  poets 
would  have  had  it,  he  stood  bathed  in  azure  light, 
for  Rosemary's  eyes  were  bluer  than  blue  seas,  deep 
er  than  the  cloudless  sky — something  of  night  in 
them. 

"Come  to-morrow,  Davie  dear,"  she  said,  "and 
tell  me  what  Robert  Henley  had  to  say  to  you. 
Somehow  I  feel  that  it's  very  important.  There's 
fate  in  it,  somehow.  Good-bye,  Davie!"  She 
touched  his  arm  with  her  hand,  and  turned  and 
went  into  the  house. 


CHAPTER  III 

THAT  afternoon  David  had  an  engagement  to 
play  tennis  with  three  lads  of  his  age  and 
liking,  but  he  begged  off  on  the  score  of  a  lame 
arm — a  half-truth,  he  had  slightly  strained  it  a 
week  before — and,  instead,  went  for  a  long  tramp 
into  the  country  quite  alone.  It  was  a  way  he 
had,  to  get  off  by  himself  and  walk  till  he  was 
exhausted,  when  matters  puzzled  and  troubled  him, 
and  on  this  day  something  vague  and  formless — 
impossible  seemingly  to  pin  down — stung  him  into 
a  sort  of  sullen,  restless  anger. 

He  had  the  feeling  that  a  very  beautiful  thing, 
sweet  and  exquisite  beyond  words,  had  fluttered 
near  to  him,  one  infinitesimal  moment  had  hung 
there,  its  wings  touching  his  face,  and  then,  because 
he  would  not  put  out  his  hand,  had  flown  away 
again.  He  searched  himself  for  the  reason  of  that 
moment's  paralyzing  fear  which  had  stayed  him, 
but  the  reason,  like  the  thing  he  had  lost,  fluttered 
beyond  his  reach.  He  could  not  grasp  it,  and  his 
eyes  could  not  see — yet.  He  called  it  Fate,  and 
his  dull,  resentful  anger  turned  to  self-pity.  He 
tramped  the  country  lanes  and  the  good  green 
fields  till  he  was  tired  and  the  sun  was  low,  feeling 

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very  sorry  for  himself  over  this  blow  which  Fate 
had  dealt  him.  It  must  be  remembered  that  he 
was  two-and-twenty. 

He  reached  home — the  old  brick  house  with  its 
white-painted  trimmings  which  an  ancient  house 
keeper,  faded  and  far  gone  in  dry  decay,  kept 
habitable  for  him — towards  seven,  in  time  for  a 
cold  tub  before  his  leisurely  dressing.  And  shortly 
before  eight  set  out  for  his  dinner  with  Robert 
Henley. 

The  rest  of  Croydon  did  not  dine — or,  to  be  quite 
accurate,  sup — at  eight.  It  took  its  evening  meal 
at  six  sharp,  and  thereafter  sat  upon  comfortable 
front  porches  and  discussed  its  little  world  while 
the  daylight  hushed  to  dusk  and  the  sweet  night 
came  down. 

David  walked  the  short  distance  down  Main 
Street,  as  conspicuous  and  set  apart  from  mankind 
in  his  finery  as  a  meteor  might  have  been.  Girls 
and  young  men  standing  at  front  gates  or  crossing 
the  streets  for  a  neighborly  call,  stared  at  him  and 
twitted  him  humorously  upon  his  raiment.  He 
fell  among  the  three  youths  with  whom  he  was  to 
have  played  tennis  that  afternoon — slim,  well-look 
ing  lads  in  cool  flannel,  each  Jack  flanked  by  his 
muslin  Jill,  and  they  laid  hands  upon  him  and 
turned  him  slowly  about  after  the  manner  of  a 
revolving  tailors'  dummy,  emitting  "Oh's"  and 
"Ah's"  of  burlesqued  admiration,  for  David,  even 
in  those  early  days  of  his,  was  something  of  a  swell 
in  the  matter  of  clothes,  and  he  had  the  height  and 

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the  shoulders  to  lend  added  smartness  to  that  which 
had  already  been  smart  when  it  left  its  maker's 
hands. 

He  escaped,  laughing,  from  these  humorists,  and 
went  on  his  way,  but,  though  his  eye  had  been 
alert,  he  reached  Robert  Henley's  gate  without  the 
sight  of  some  one  he  had  looked  for  and  hoped  to 
see,  if  only  in  a  little,  sweet  glimpse.  That  some  one 
sat  still  and  rigid  behind  the  sheltering  vines  of  a 
deep  porch,  but  her  blue  eyes  followed  David  in  his 
walk,  and  watched  him  swing  open  the  Henley  gate 
and  turn  for  one  last  survey  of  Main  Street — she 
knew  well  enough  what  he  was  looking  for — and 
finally  disappeared  among  the  shrubbery  before  old 
Robert's  stately  home. 

It  may  perhaps  safely  be  presumed  that  the  laws 
of  the  Medes  and  Persians  so  long  celebrated  for 
unvarying  stability — that  even  those  laws  were 
known  upon  extreme  occasion  to  vary  the  breadth 
of  a  hair — the  occasional  bolt  will  fall  from  the  blue 
heaven,  the  millionth  blackbird  prove  white.  The 
habits  of  Robert  Henley  might  have  been  termed 
petrified,  like  the  above-mentioned  laws  of  just  fame, 
they  altered  not,  yet  on  this  very  day  of  David's 
dining  with  him  the  old  gentleman  had  deliberately 
broken  one  of  the  most  steadfast  of  his  customs  of 
antiquity.  For  twenty  years  it  had  been  his  habit 
once  each  week — on  Wednesday,  to-wit — to  go  at 
nine  in  the  morning  to  the  Eagle  Hotel;  there,  by 
means  of  the  brandy  kept  especially  for  him,  to 
begin  the  day's  inebriation ;  at  ten  to  return  home — 

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his  hands  under  his  coat-tails;  at  five  in  the  after 
noon  to  recommence,  and,  somewhat  after  mid 
night,  to  be  delivered  under  the  porte-cochere  of  his 
house  from  a  "hack,"  into  the  arms  of  the  faithful 
William,  who  tenderly  put  him  to  bed.  It  will  be 
evident  that  his  reasons  for  intermitting  on  this  day 
the  custom  of  so  many  years  must  have  been  un 
commonly  strong  ones. 

David  in  the  entr'acte,  as  it  were,  of  his  more 
personal  troubles,  had  that  afternoon  puzzled  his 
brain  many  times  over  the  phenomenon,  and,  as 
the  courtly  William  bowed  him  into  old  Robert's 
library,  he  raised  his  eyes  a  bit  nervously  to  see  just 
what  he  was  to  face.  He  remembered  that  elderly 
figure  which  had  stood  swaying  beside  the  front 
gate  only  a  few  hours  before. 

But  if  old  Robert  had  been  drunk  in  the  morn 
ing — and  he  most  certainly  had,  as  witnesseth  the 
tale  of  the  albatross  —  he  had  made  a  swift  and 
thorough  recovery.  No  sign  of  the  morning's  state 
remained  with  him,  save  perhaps  that  his  habitual 
pallor  may  have  been  a  bit  intensified  and  his  eyes 
and  cheeks  a  little  haggard — such  ravages  as  an 
ordinary  headache  might  leave. 

"Ah,  David,  my  boy,  you're  on  time — punctual 
to  the  minute,"  he  said.  "I  like  that.  I  like  that. 
Punctuality  is  a  good  old-fashioned  virtue.  But 
it's  going  out — going  out.  People  seem  to  think 
it's  provincial  to  be  prompt  now  a  days.  Maybe 
so." 

He  put  up  his  hands  on  David's  two  shoulders. 
37 


A    STUMBLING-BLOCK 

He  was  a  tall  old  man  when  he  stood  straight,  but 
David  was  the  taller. 

"Eh,  but  you've  grown  to  be  a  fine  up-standing 
lad!"  said  he.  He  always  said  this  to  David.  It 
was  a  sort  of  formula.  "Long  and  weedy,"  he 
said,  "but  you'll  fill  that  out  a  little — not  much — 
but  a  little.  She  was  slender — slender." 

This  did  not  belong  to  the  formula,  and  David 
wondered. 

"And  tall,"  said  old  Robert.  "Ay,  you're  like 
her,  David —  So  it  must  have  been  the  boy's 
mother,  dead  when  he  was  a  child,  whom  Robert 
meant. 

"There's  very  little  Rivers  about  you,"  he  said. 
"You're  like  her."  The  worn  old  face  twisted  sud 
denly,  as  if  at  some  twinge,  and  Robert  turned 
away  and  fiddled  with  one  of  the  candles  on  the 
near-by  table,  which  had  begun  to  flare  and  smoke. 

The  ancient  William  bowed  low  in  the  doorway, 
saying : 

"Dinnuh  am  radey,  Marse  Robbut,"  and  the 
two  went  out  into  the  wainscotted  dining-room, 
where  many  candles  flickered  and  shed  their  soft 
light.  And  as  they  went,  old  Robert  Henley 
leaned  upon  the  younger  man's  shoulder. 

They  made  a  very  pleasant  dinner  of  it,  though 
by  no  means  a  merry  one,  for  old  Robert  never  so 
far  unbent  as  to  be  merry — it  would  have  become 
him  ill.  He  had  his  stiff  fashion  of  jesting,  but  the 
jests  smelled  of  leather  like  his  library — fine  old 
dignified  jests  with  a  "sir"  on  the  end  of  them. 

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David  liked  these  rare  dinners.  They  had  a  flavor 
quite  of  their  own.  He  had  sat  at  many  more  pre 
tentious  ones  in  Boston  and  in  New  York,  and  in 
the  country  during  the  briefer  of  his  college  vaca 
tions,  or  even  in  term-time,  but  none  of  these  had 
the  peculiar  dignity  of  Robert  Henley's  table,  with 
its  heavy  old  English  glass  and  its  heavy  old  Eng 
lish  silver;  and  at  none  of  them  sat  a  man  quite 
like  old  Robert.  The  artist  in  David  took  great 
delight  of  old  Robert  the  while  the  heart  in  him 
was  moved  to  respect  and  to  genuine  liking  and,  in 
many  ways,  to  sincere  admiration.  Had  the  elder 
man  been  more  demonstrative,  laid  off  sometimes 
that  armor  of  dignity  and  old-time  ceremony  which 
he  wore,  the  fatherless  and  motherless  lad  must 
have  loved  and  clung  to  him.  It  is  probable  that 
old  Robert  knew  this,  but  the  armor  had  been  worn 
a  long,  long  time  and  its  joints  were  rusted  home. 

They  talked  of  David's  past  year  in  college,  and 
of  the  vast  changes  there  since  Robert's  day.  And 
David  prodded  the  old  gentleman  to  tales  of  what 
the  town  and  the  university  had  been  in  his  own 
time — the  late  'fifties;  from  that  again  to  Oxford 
and  to  London  and  Paris,  and  a  somewhat  stormy 
year  at  Heidelberg.  They  were  old  stories.  David 
knew  them  as  well  as  the  teller  did,  but  he  liked  to 
hear  them  told  in  old  Robert's  dry  pedantic  fash 
ion  with  old  -  style  oaths  and  the  slang  of  a  by 
gone  period.  He  was  wondering  what  the  "matter 
of  business"  was  that  had  brought  him  to  the  house, 
but  old  Robert  made  no  allusion  to  it,  and  the  lad 

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waited  respectfully  while  the  dinner  went  forward 
and  at  last  came  to  its  end. 

Then,  when  the  table  had  been  cleared  and  the 
cloth  removed — as  the  custom  had  been  in  Robert 
Henley's  day — when  the  ancient  William  had  set 
out  the  coffee  things  and  had  filled  David's  littleglass 
with  a  queer,  sweet  red  liqueur  (Parfait  Amour], 
but  not  the  host's,  for  old  Robert  had  drunk  water 
throughout  the  meal,  while  David  sipped  good 
sherry  and  Chambertin ;  then  Robert  Henley  light 
ed  his  black  cigar  and  took  a  breath  and  said : 

"Now  for  it,  David!" 

The  ancient  William  had  gone  out  of  the  room 
and  the  two  were  alone. 

David  said,  "Yes,  sir!"  and  waited. 

"It  appears,  David,"  said  the  old  gentleman, 
"that  you  have  a  certain  knack  at  stringing  words 
together." 

"It  appears  so,  sir,"  said  David. 

"A  knack,"  pursued  old  Robert,  "conspicuous 
enough  to  have  won  a  measure  of  praise  from  a  man 
who  is  an  editor  and  a  scholar  and  a  gentleman, 
sir." 

This  seemed  to  demand  no  answer. 

"I  am  glad,  David,"  said  Robert  Henley,  nodding 
gravely,  "because  it  seems  to  point  you,  with  no 
uncertain  finger,  to  a  calling  which  is  a  gentleman's 
calling  and  which  will,  independently  of  success  or 
failure,  give  you  a  refuge  from  the  world  so  long  as 
you  live — a  pleasant  pasture  to  lie  down  in — a  world 
of  the  mind  to  flee  to  when  the  world  of  the  flesh 

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is  a  little  more  damned  disagreeable  than  you  can 
bear.  Very  well,  sir.  It  appears  that  you  have  this 
talent.  Now,  what  are  you  going  to  do  about  it?'' 

David  stirred  in  his  chair.  Everybody  seemed 
curiously  bent  upon  finding  out  what  he  meant  "to 
do  about  it." 

"Work  at  it,  I  suppose,  sir,"  said  he.  "What 
else?" 

"Here?"  demanded  old  Robert. 

Were  Rosemary  and  Robert  Henley  in  a  con 
spiracy  to  drive  him  from  Croydon  ? 

"There's  no  better  place  to  work,"  he  submitted. 

Old  Robert  shook  his  head. 

"  You  must  have  something  to  work  at,"  said  he. 
"You  must  reflect,  but  you  must  have  something 
to  reflect  upon.  You  must  see  the  world,  David." 

"I  haven't  the  means,  sir,"  said  David,  bluntly. 
"I  cannot  travel  on  a  thousand  dollars  a  year.  I 
could  not  even  live  in  any  large  city  on  it — that  is, 
with  any  comfort." 

Robert  Henley  carefully  removed  the  ash  from 
his  black  cigar  and  sat  for  a  little  time  looking 
down  at  it  where  it  lay  in  an  intact  cylinder  before 
him. 

"That — might  possibly  be  arranged,"  he  said. 
He  heard  David  utter  a  quick  exclamation  under 
his  breath,  and  presently  looked  up  at  him. 

"Would  you  like  to  see  the  world,  David?"  he 
asked,  unsmiling. 

' '  Like  to  ?"  said  David,  in  a  sort  of  whisper.  ' '  My 
God!  like  to?"  David's  eyes  were  shining,  and  the 

4  41 


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old  gentleman  thought  his  face  had  gone  whiter 
under  the  sudden  stress  of  feeling. 

"Like  to!"  David  said  again,  under  his  breath, 
and  his  eyes  looked  through  old  Robert  Henley  and 
beyond  him  out  over  lands  and  seas  of  romance  and 
adventure.  After  all,  the  artist  was  strong  in  the 
lad,  and  the  Romany  spirit  is  strong  in  every 
artist.  The  gypsy  blood  in  David  rose  swift  to  the 
call  of  the  out-trail,  and  his  hands  shook  before  him 
on  the  black  polished  oak  of  the  table. 

"Yes,  sir,"  he  said,  simply,  after  a  little,  "I 
should  like  to  very  much.  If  I  could  manage,  say, 
a  year  of  it,  or  even  less!  If  you  thought  it  might 
be  worth  while  to  dip  into  my  principal  for  a  few 
months'  travel  in  England  and  on  the  Continent! 
I  can't  help  thinking  it  would  be  wise,  sir.  I  can't 
help  thinking  that  I  should  get  on  faster." 

Old  Robert  nodded  a  slow  gray  head. 

"I  have  been  thinking  it  over,  David,"  said  he. 
Once  more  he  bent  over  his  cigar  and  occupied  him 
self  with  it  in  silence  for  a  little  time.  He  seemed 
to  find  it  oddly  difficult  to  say  what  he  had  to  say. 
David  watched  him  as  a  criminal  on  trial  watches 
the  face  of  his  judge. 

"  I  should  like  to  see  you  get  on,  David,"  he  said, 
at  last,  and  slowly.  "I  should  like  to  see  you  get 
on  as  fast  as  you  can — as  fast  as  you  safely  can. 
I — have  no  son  of  my  own.  I — for  reasons  which 
I  may  one  day  tell  you — I  found  it  impossible,  long 
ago,  to  marry.  And  so  I  have  watched  you  grow 
up  with  somewhat  the  feelings  I  should  have  had 

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towards  my  own  son.  I  have  not  only  stood  in 
loco  parentis  to  you,  David,  but  I  have  felt  towards 
you  in  loco  parentis." 

David's  eyes  widened,  and  he  drew  a  little,  quick 
breath  of  extreme  surprise.  This  was  very  unlike 
old  Robert.  He  must  be  uncommonly  moved. 

"I  want,  more  than  I  want  almost  anything  else," 
pursued  Robert  Henley,  "to  see  you  get  on  to  the 
very  best  advantage  —  without  let  or  hindrance, 
without  obstacle  or  entanglement." 

David  stirred  impatiently  in  his  chair. 

"I  think,"  said  old  Robert,  "that  travel  and 
observation  in  countries  other  than  our  own  are 
necessary  to  a  man  who  would  know  his  fellow- 
men.  I  think  they  are  necessary  to  you.  But, 
David,"  he  said,  for  the  first  time  looking  up,  "if  I 
consent  to  your  'dipping  into  your  principal,'  as 
you  call  it,  for  even  so  worthy  a  purpose  as  this,  I 
must  be  allowed  to  do  it  in  my  own  fashion,  which 
I  feel  to  be  a  wise  fashion.  I  must  make  condi 
tions." 

David  drew  a  great  shivering  breath  and  let  it 
out  again.  His  cheeks  were  flushed  and  lights  had 
come  into  his  eyes. 

"Oh,  any  conditions  you  like,  Uncle  Robert!"  he 
cried.  "Any  you  like!  Who  am  I  to  haggle  over 
conditions  ?  I  shall  see  the  things  I  Ve  dreamed  of. 
I  shall — I  can't  say  it!  I've  so  long  wanted  to  do 
this,  and  thought  it  was  beyond  possibility.  I'm — 
I'm  a  bit  off  my  head  about  it.  But  it's  good  of 
you,  Uncle  Robert!  By  Jove,  it's  good  of  you  to 

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see  it  as  I  do.  I  promise  you  I  sha'n't  waste  the 
time.  I  promise  you  that.  It  '11  be  only  a  few 
months,  anyhow.  I  can  see  and  learn  heaps  in 
a  few  months.  Then  I'll  come  quietly  back  here 
and  think  it  over — let  it — soak  in."  He  was  con 
scious  of  a  sudden  mad  desire  to  dash  off  and  tell 
Rosemary  of  this  stupendous  luck.  The  desire  was 
so  strong  in  him  that  he  was  on  the  point  of  asking 
Robert  Henley  if  he  might,  but  he  reflected  that  it 
would  be  hardly  respectful. 

"My  conditions,  David,"  said  old  Robert,  in  his 
gentle,  pedantic  tone,  and  David,  with  a  wrench, 
recalled  himself  to  earth. 

' '  Oh  yes,  of  course !"  he  said,  apologetically.  "  I'd 
forgotten.  Of  course!  Any  conditions  you  like, 
sir.  I'm  too  grateful  to  object  to  them,  whatever 
they  may  be." 

"My  conditions,"  said  old  Robert,  with  gravity, 
"are  based  partly  upon  my  belief  that  half-way 
measures  are  unwise,  partly  upon  my  observations 
of  the  very  sad  wreck  which  many  young  and  prom 
ising  men  have  made  of  their  careers  by  starting 
upon  those  careers  with  entanglements — millstones 
about  their  necks.  I  will  provide  you,  David,  with 
the  sum  of  three  thousand  dollars  each  year  for 
three  years  on  condition  that  you  spend  those  years 
in  travel,  study,  observation,  what  you  will,  but 
do  not  before  the  end  of  three  years  return  to  Cray  don. 
Wait!  Wait!  And  that  you  leave  Croydon  for 
your  travels  unentangled.  I  think  you  understand 
me." 

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A    STUMBLING-BLOCK 

David  sprang  to  his  feet  with  a  head  on  fire,  and 
stood,  bereft  of  speech,  dumbly  staring.  It  may 
have  been  that  there  was  fire  also  in  his  staring  eyes, 
but  old  Robert  Henley,  sitting  still  at  the  head 
of  the  table,  met  them  full  and  did  not  flinch. 
His  own  pale,  protruding  eyes  seemed  somehow 
to  have  darkened  and  to  have  receded  under 
their  bushy  brows,  where  they  glowed  in  deep 
shadow. 

"You — mean,"  said  David,  in  a  slow  whisper, 
"Rosemary!  -You  mean — Rosemary  Crewe!" 

"We  are  two  gentlemen,  David,"  said  Robert 
Henley,  "alone  in  a  gentleman's  house  where  there 
are  no  ladies.  Let  us  not  deal  with  names!" 

"You  mean  —  Rosemary  Crewe!"  said  David 
again,  in  his  slow  whisper.  It  would  be  difficult  to 
tell  what  his  staring  said — amazement,  fear,  anger, 
perhaps.  But  certainly,  most  of  all,  amazement, 
a  bewildered  daze. 

"You  are  beginning  your  life,  David,"  said  Rob 
ert  Henley.  "You  must  have  no  millstones  about 
your  neck." 

David  found  his  voice. 

"Millstones!"  he  cried  out,  in  a  sort  of  fierce, 
despairing  rage.  "A  millstone  round  my  neck! 
I  tell  you  she's  a  goddess  who  sits  so  high  I  can 
touch  the  hem  of  her  skirt  only  by  reaching  up  to 
it.  Millstone!  I  tell  you,  sir,  she's  all  the  good 
ness  of  all  the  good  women  who  ever  lived  in  this 
world  and  died  and  went  to  heaven!  She's  all  the 
sweetness  of  all  the  flowers  that  grow — all  the 

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music  that  sounds!  I  tell  you  she's  all  the  beauty 
of  the  blue  sky  and  the  stars  at  night  and  the 
things  you  see  in  dreams.  She's  all  the  tender 
sweetness  that — that — "  He  gave  a  sudden  dry 
sob.  ' '  How  dare  you  call  her  a  millstone  round  my 
neck!"  he  cried.  "You  never  in  all  your  long  life 
knew  a  woman  who  had  one-millionth  part  of  the 
littlest—" 

"Stop,  sir!"  thundered  old  Robert  Henley,  and 
David  halted,  gasping. 

Old  Robert  stood  upright  in  his  place,  shaking 
very  violently,  as  if  he  were  suddenly  ill.  His  face 
was  white  and  there  were  strange,  deep  furrows  in 
it.  But  after  a  moment  something  in  the  savage 
tenseness  of  him  seemed  to  break  and  his  fierce  old 
eyes  dropped.  He  sank  back,  a  bit  wearily,  in  his 
chair  and  his  chin  settled  upon  his  breast.  His 
hands  stirred  upon  the  table  before  him. 

"I — beg  your  pardon,  David!"  he  said,  in  a  low 
tone.  "I — something  you  said — I — lost  my  pres 
ence  of  mind." 

David's  little  outburst  of  rage  had  died  before 
this  swift  and  sudden  tempest.  He  realized  dimly 
that  in  his  anger  he  had  touched  and  disturbed 
something  very  sacred  in  the  life  of  the  old  man 
before  him,  and  it  made  his  own  resentment  appear 
to  him  all  at  once  petty  and  childish  and  of  small 
account. 

"It  was  all  my  fault,  Uncle  Robert,"  he  said. 
"I'm  sorry.  I  beg  your  pardon,  sir!  I  didn't 
mean —  Only — I'm  afraid  you  don't  quite  under- 

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stand   about — Rosemary.     I'm   afraid   you   don't 
quite  know." 

"Oh  yes,  David,"  said  old  Robert,  staring  at  the 
hands  which  moved  weakly  before  him  on  the  table- 
top.  "Oh  yes,  I  know!"  He  looked  up.  "Is 
there — any  understanding  between  you?"  he  de 
manded. 

David  flushed  and  for  a  moment  did  not  answer. 

"No,  sir!"  he  said  at  last. 

Old  Robert  drew  a  quick  breath  which  may  have 
been  relief. 

"And  you  think,"  the  elder  man  pressed  on — 
"you  think  she  would  try  to  keep  you  here  if  she 
knew  of — this?" 

David  gave  a  little,  bitter  smile. 

"You  don't  know  her,  sir,"  said  he. 

"A  little,  perhaps,  David,"  said  old  Robert. 
"Perhaps  a  little.  I  have  seen  her  face.  Perhaps 
I  know  her  well  enough  to  be  sure  of  what  she 
would  say  if  she  were  here  now  and  we  were  to  ask 
her  what  she  would  have  you  do." 

"Three  years!"  said  young  David,  staring  across 
the  room.  There  was  a  sort  of  wondering  dismay 
in  his  tone. 

"And,"  said  Robert  Henley,  "you  leave  Croy- 
don,  free — unentangled.  David,  I  am  fighting  for 
your  life,  for  the  work  you  are  to  do,  for  the  career 
that  you  may  win  or  lose  through  your  decision 
this  night." 

"I  will  not  go!"  said  David,  white-faced,  tight- 
lipped. 

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A    STUMBLING-BLOCK 

"Think  twice,  David!"  said  old  Robert,  with  a 
sudden  sharp  agony  in  his  voice. 

"I  will  not  go,"  said  David.  "If  I  go,  and  re 
main  away  three  years,  I  shall  lose  her." 

"And  if  you  stay,"  said  old  Robert,  "you  will 
remain  unworthy  of  her." 

David  gave  a  little  cry  and  hid  his  face  upon  his 
arms  over  the  table. 

"I  speak  to  the  artist  in  you,  David,"  said  the 
other  man.  "You  have  been  given  talents,  and 
talents  bear  responsibility  with  them.  An  artist 
does  not  live  to  himself.  You  have  a  solemn  duty 
to  perform — to  give  to  the  world  the  best  that  can 
be  developed  in  you.  The  best!  The  artist  must 
ever  make  sacrifices.  I  call  on  you  now  to  make 
the  first  of  yours." 

David  raised  his  head,  staring  with  eyes  full  of 
misery. 

"Such  as  you,  David,"  said  old  Robert,  very 
gently,  "are  the  royalty  of  the  mind.  You  know 
what  royalty  must  suffer  and  sacrifice  for  the  gen 
eral  good.  There  may  be  greatness  in  you,"  he 
said,  after  a  little.  "We  must  not  smother  it." 

David  suddenly  beat  his  two  hands  upon  the 
table. 

"I  will  not  go!"  he  said  again,  breathing  hard; 
but  he  said  it  in  a  whisper  and  there  was  no  strength 
in  the  whisper. 

"  David,"  said  the  old  man,  "  I  have  set  my  heart 
upon  this  thing.  I  ask  you  to  do  it  for  my  sake. 
I  have  never  asked  or  commanded  you  to  do  any- 

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A    STUMBLING-BLOCK 

thing  of  moment  before.  I  have  advised  and  sug 
gested,  but,  though  I  had  a  certain  right,  I  have 
never  commanded.  I  cannot  command  now,  for 
you  are  of  age,  but,  for  the  first  time,  I  ask  with 
great  earnestness.  Do  this  thing  for  me!" 

David  stared  at  him,  sunk  into  a  miserable 
apathy. 

Old  Robert  bent  his  head  and  for  a  moment  cov 
ered  his  eyes  with  one  hand.  His  lips  muttered. 
Presently  he  rose  to  his  feet  and  took  up  one  of  the 
branched  candlesticks  from  the  table. 

"Come  with  me,  David!"  he  said,  and  David 
followed  him,  dully  wondering. 

They  went  out  into  the  dim,  great  hall  and  down 
it  towards  the  front  of  the  house.  Robert  Henley 
pulled  open  certain  sliding-doors,  and  they  entered 
a  vast  room  dark  save  for  the  flickering  glow  which 
the  candles  brought  into  it.  The  furniture  stood 
about  sheeted  with  white,  like  tombstones  in  a 
church-yard.  Old  Robert  went  to  that  end  of  the 
room  where  he  had  gone  in  the  morning,  where  hung 
upon  the  wall  over  the  brass  and  malachite  table  a 
Gothic  frame,  Italian  of  fashioning,  the  gold  dull 
and  flaked  off  in  spots  through  great  age. 

Robert  Henley  put  out  his  free  hand  and  the 
hand  fumbled  at  the  twin  doors  of  the  frame. 
Then  they  swung  open,  and  David,  looking  over 
the  old  man's  shoulder,  gave  a  sudden  cry. 

"It's  my  mother!"  he  said.     "It's  my  mother!" 

"Yes,  David,"  said  old  Robert.  His  face,  in 
the  dim  light  of  the  candles,  was  working  oddly. 

49 


A    STUMBLING-BLOCK 

"She  gave  you  into  my  care,  lad,"  he  said.  "In 
a  fashion,  you  were  in  my  care  before,  for  your 
father  had  been  dead  some  months  and  I  was  his 
executor;  but  she  gave  you  into  my  care.  Even 
then,  although  you  were  but  a  child  of  three,  she 
had  her  dreams  for  you.  She  said :  '  He's  different, 
Robert.  He's  not  quite  like  other  children.  He'll 
have  a  career,  I  think.  I  don't  know  what  it  will 
be,  but  he's  destined  to  something  high.  I  feel 
that.'  And  she  said,  before  she  died:  'Let  noth 
ing  harm  him  or  check  him,  Robert.  I  leave  him 
to  you.  Make  the  way  smooth  for  him  as  much  as 
you  can." 

The  candlestick  shook  and  wavered  in  old  Rob 
ert's  hand,  so  that  he  had  to  set  it  down  on  the 
malachite  table.  He  faced  the  boy  over  the  mellow 
glow  of  the  candle-light,  and  from  her  carven  frame 
David's  mother,  leaning  forward  a  bit — beautiful, 
young,  eager — watched  the  two. 

It  was  the  first  time  that  the  lad  had  ever  seen 
Robert  Henley  betray  emotion.  He  was  not  dull, 
and  even  through  the  stress  of  his  own  sick  be 
wilderment  he  looked  upon  old  Robert's  twisting 
face  and  understood.  Robert  won  his  battle  in 
that  moment. 

"You  must  go,  David!"  he  said,  in  a  sort  of 
whisper. 

David  looked  into  his  mother's  tender  eyes. 

"I'll  go,"  said  he. 


CHAPTER  IV 

DAVID  came  out  into  the  night  with — so  it 
seemed  to  him  —  every  nerve  in  his  body 
a -tingle.  Things  fiery  and  grotesque,  kaleido 
scopic,  wheeled  before  his  mind's  eyes  so  that  the 
eyes  of  his  body  scarce  took  heed  of  where  he 
went.  He  had  the  feeling  of  having  been  torn 
bodily  from  the  world  he  knew  and  cast  into  a 
strange  world  where  he  was  alone  and  afraid. 

There  was  in  him  no  sense  of  exultation  over  the 
three  years  to  come,  no  joy  over  the  realization  of 
wild  hopes  made  true,  dreams  brought  to  pass. 
That  would,  he  knew,  come  later.  For  the  present 
there  was  only  pain  for  the  loss  of  those  sweet, 
familiar  things  which  had  made  his  life  and  which 
he  loved — the  comfortable  things  of  daily  habit 
grown  sweet  through  long  experience. 

The  soft  summer  night  was  about  him — a  moon 
less  night,  with  a  million  tender  stars,  with  a  little 
vagrant  breeze  which  bore  down  the  long  street 
under  the  arch  of  maples,  bringing  faint,  sweet 
odors — the  incense  of  the  teeming  darkness.  David 
turned  his  hot  face  to  the  wind,  and  the  quiet,  fra 
grant  peace  of  it  all  smote  at  his  heart  with  a  sweet 
keenness  which  was  a  sort  of  agony. 


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Blindly  he  bore  up  the  street  bareheaded,  his  hat 
under  one  arm.  He  did  not  know  where  he  went, 
but  his  feet,  through  old  habit,  led  him  true.  He 
found  himself  halted  before  a  gate  which  seemed  to 
him  in  that  moment  of  recognition  the  gate  to  his 
paradise,  the  gate  to  all  beautiful  dream-gardens, 
to  all  things  lovely  and  full  of  sweet  peace  and 
content. 

"But  the  gate  is  locked!"  a  voice  said  to  him, 
and  David  gave  a  little,  sharp  cry  aloud.  "  You've 
locked  it!"  the  voice  said;  "not  old  Robert  Henley 
or  his  talk  of  duty  and  obligation — not  even  your 
dead  mother,  whom  old  Robert  brought  into  the 
battle  to  face  you  down.  You've  locked  it  your 
self,  because  you  set  ambition  before  love;  that's 
what  you've  done,"  the  voice  said,  and  David  be 
gan  to  tremble  a  little  in  the  dark,  for  the  voice 
spoke  true. 

He  sat  down  upon  the  stone  "horse-block"  be 
fore  Rosemary's  gate,  staring  miserably  into  the 
gloom  where,  among  its  lilacs  and  syringas,  its  snow 
balls  and  bush-cranberries,  Rosemary's  house  loom 
ed  squat  and  square,  faintly  pallid  in  the  starlight. 
Rosemary  was  sleeping  there.  As  a  matter  of  fact, 
she  wasn't.  She  was  lying  awake,  with  hands 
clinched  tight  beside  her  and  wide,  still  eyes  front 
ing  the  night  wherein,  it  seemed  to  her,  some  vague 
power  hung  portentous  to  do  her  evil.  But  David 
did  not  know  that.  He  was  fronting  his  own 
shamed  soul,  over  which  stood  another  David  armed 
to  do  battle,  an  artist  David,  who  had  soaring  ambi- 

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tions,  and  cried  fiercely  that  nothing  in  God's  world 
should  stand  in  their  way — not  even  love. 

David,  in  that  abased  hour,  fronted  his  naked 
soul  and  at  last  knew  it  for  what  it  was,  and  knew 
also  that  other  self,  the  craftsman,  the  creator, 
with  which  he,  and  all  such  as  he,  were  doomed  to 
struggle  and  war  so  long  as  life  was  in  him  and 
blood  ran  in  his  veins. 

"That,"  said  David,  very  bitterly,  "was  why  I 
let  her  go  this  morning.  It's  quite  plain.  I  was  a 
coward.  As  much  as  I  can  love  anything — and  that 
is  a  great  deal — I  love  her,  I  suppose.  She  is  very 
wonderful.  There  are  no  words  for  her.  There  are 
no  women  like  her.  But  I  was  a  coward.  I  let  her 
go  in  the  one  moment  when  she  would  have  come 
to  me — and  she  knew  it." 

Oddly,  as  he  sat  there,  the  speech  of  the  youthful 
Mr.  Tows,  the  Oracle,  came  to  him,  "I'd  rather  be 
a  soldier  'n'  fight."  And  David  gave  a  short, 
amazed  laugh  that  had  no  mirth  in  it.  How  pat! 
"Out  of  the  mouth  of  the  infant  Samuel,"  indeed! 

He  sat  a  long  time  under  the  warm  gloom  of 
the  maples,  facing  the  house  where  Rosemary  lay, 
and,  manlike,  now  that  she  was  quite  beyond  his 
reach,  his  mind  dwelt  upon  her  with  a  yearning 
bitterness  which  was  almost  too  keen  to  bear.  All 
the  manifold  loveliness  of  her  came  to  haunt  him, 
all  the  innumerable  tendernesses,  all  the  thousand 
sweet  ways  Rosemary  had  of  herself  alone,  ways 
quite  unlike  the  ways  of  other  women.  She  pressed 
close  in  upon  him  out  of  the  dark,  holding  him  with 

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her  hands;  the  blue,  unfathomable  mystery  of  her 
eyes  was  very  near  to  his  eyes ;  her  voice  besought 
him,  saying:  "Don't  leave  me,  Davie,  Davie!  If 
you  leave  me  you  won't  come  back  until  it's  too 
late.  Stay  with  me!" 

David  hid  his  head  in  his  arms  as  if  that  voice 
had  been  an  actual  voice,  loud  upon  the  night. 
Mad,  desperate  words  crowded  to  his  lips  and 
stammered  there.  He  cried  out  again  that  he 
would  not  go,  that  he  would  not  be  robbed  of  what 
was  so  precious  to  him ;  but  the  voice  was  a  feeble 
thing  and  meaningless — a  sort  of  impotent  hysteria. 
His  word  had  been  given,  and  David  was  not  in  the 
way  of  breaking  his  word. 

Then,  after  a  time,  he  rose  blindly  and  once  more 
turned  up  the  street,  heedless  of  where  he  went. 
So  he  came  at  last  to  the  crest  of  the  long,  slow  rise 
where  Main  Street  ended,  and  dropping  sharply 
away  to  cross  a  broad,  low  stretch  of  meadow-lands, 
the  country  high-road  streamed  away  into  the  star 
lit  gloom. 

David  stood  looking  out  into  the  great,  dusk 
hollow  of  low  land  before  him,  as  one  pausing  upon 
the  threshold  of  his  good,  familiar  house  gazes  into 
an  unknown  world  without.  The  mood  of  bitter 
rebellion,  a  sort  of  premonitory  homesickness  and 
loneliness,  persisted  still  in  him,  with  a  blind  desire 
to  tear  himself  free  from  his  compact  and  remain. 

A  shooting-star  flashed  across  the  sky  before  him 
comet-wise,  and  then  another,  and  another  still. 
Three  falling  stars.  That  should  be  portentous  of 

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something.  From  the  deep  wooded  lawn  of  the 
Howard  place  near  by  the  breeze  bore  a  strong, 
acrid  scent  of  balsam  pine.  Afterwards,  so  long 
as  he  lived,  there  came  to  David's  nostrils  in  hours 
of  great  strain  or  distress  the  keen,  acrid  scent  of 
balsam  pine. 

He  drew  a  little,  weary  sigh  and  turned  back 
homeward.  His  head  and  shoulders  drooped  as 
he  went,  and  at  his  heart  there  were  pain  and  bit 
terness;  but  somewhere  within  him,  subconscious 
perhaps  but  alive,  the  other  David  stood  exultant, 
his  eyes  fixed  upon  the  future — the  other  David 
who  had  high  ambitions  and  said  stubbornly  that 
nothing  should  come  in  their  way,  not  even  love. 

He  left  Croydon  at  the  end  of  the  week,  spurred 
on  by  old  Robert  Henley,  who  would  not  rest  until 
the  lad  was  safely  on  his  way. 

Breaking  the  news  of  departure  to  Rosemary  had 
proved  a  simpler  thing  than  he  had  feared — or  per 
haps  hoped.  Rosemary  managed  that.  In  that 
strange  and  mysterious  fashion  in  which  she  seemed 
always  to  foreknow  all  things,  she  was  prepared  for 
it — betrayed  neither  astonishment  nor  pain.  She 
turned  her  slow  eyes  to  David's  face  when  he  told 
her,  and  then  for  a  little  time  away.  And  presently 
she  said: 

"It's  the  best  thing,  Davie.  I  am  glad,  glad  for 
you." 

David  had  a  swift,  little,  unworthy  rush  of  bit 
terness. 

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"And  you,  Rose-Marie?"  he  demanded. 

"Oh,  /,  Davie?"  said  she,  sweet  and  unrebuking. 
"I  must  be  glad  of  anything  that's  good  for  you — 
anything!  I  want  you  to  have  a  chance.  I  want 
you  to  be  able  to  do  the  best  that's  in  you."  And 
after  a  time  she  said:  "I'm  such  a  quiet,  peaceful 
soul!  I  shall  just  live  on  here  as  I've  always  done, 
I  expect.  I'm  one  of  the  patient  plodders,  Davie." 
(Which  was  not  true.  She  was  far  from  that.) 

So,  very  bravely,  she  held  away  the  crisis  of  that 
strain  which  was  alive  between  them,  and  would 
not  read — or,  reading,  would  not  acknowledge — the 
pain  and  the  appeal  in  David's  eyes.  For  the  rest 
of  the  week  she  avoided  being  alone  with  him,  only, 
on  the  morning  of  his  departure,  when  he  came 
early  for  a  last  word,  she  went  out  alone  to  meet 
him  into  the  pleached  walk.  David  remembered 
afterwards  that  she  was  white  and  that  there  were 
dark  circles  round  her  eyes,  but  at  the  moment  he 
was  conscious  of  little  beyond  his  own  pain. 

She  raised  her  eyes  to  him,  and  David  had  for 
one  last  time  that  strange  sense  of  being  bathed  in 
blue  light. 

He  said:  "Oh,  Rose-Marie!  Rose-Marie!"  and  his 
tongue  stammered  and  could  make  no  more  words. 

"Good-bye,  Davie,  dear!"  said  she.  "Oh,  good 
bye!  It's — going  to  be  lonely.  Three  years  is  so 
very  long!"  She  put  out  her  two  hands  upon  his 
arms  as  he  stood  before  her,  and  David  began  to 
shake. 

"Rose-Marie,"  he  said,  in  a  whisper,  "I — want 
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to — kiss  you,  once.  Just  once  before  I  go.  I  want 
it  to — live  with." 

Rosemary  drew  a  little,  quick  breath  and  she 
leaned  towards  him,  holding  his  two  arms  with  her 
hands.  But  when  she  was  near  and  David's  head 
had  bent  over  her,  breathless,  she  turned  her  cheek 
to  him  suddenly  and  he  kissed  that.  The  girl  gave 
a  single  dry  sob. 

Then,  after  a  moment,  when  neither  of  them 
spoke,  she  put  her  hand  to  her  breast  and  took 
something  and  pinned  it  upon  David's  coat. 

4 'What  is  it?"  he  asked. 

"Rosemary,  Davie,"  said  she.  "That's  for  re 
membrance." 

And  after  another  moment  he  went  away.  He 
turned  once  at  the  gate  to  look  back,  and  the  girl 
stood  still  where  he  had  left  her.  She  gave  a  little 
smile  and  waved  her  hand  to  him.  And  she  called 
out: 

"Only  three  years,  Davie!"  But  when  at  last  he 
had  gone  from  sight  she  put  her  hands  over  her  face, 
and  then  presently  clasped  them  very  tight  at  her 
heart  as  if  something  hurt  her  there. 

"I've  lost  him!"  she  said.  "He  will  not  come 
back.  I've  lost  him!" 

Croydon  talked  him  over  when  he  had  gone,  but 
rather  apathetically,  for  there  had  always  been  a 
feeling  in  the  village  that  young  David  was,  in  spite 
of  his  local  birth,  somehow  a  mere  sojourner.  His 
four  years  at  college  had  got  Croydon  out  of  the 
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way  of  considering  him.  And,  beyond  that,  it  was 
recognized  that  he  was  not  the  sort  which  remains. 
He  had  "ideas,"  as  had  been  the  case  with  several 
youths  before  him  who  had  deserted  the  colors  for 
a  wider  battle-field,  and  had  come  back  afterwards 
for  brief  visits,  displaying  extreme  garments  of  New 
York  origin  and  rather  more  money  than  was  locally 
esteemed  to  be  in  good  taste. 

In  the  matter  of  David  Rivers,  the  chief  topic  of 
discussion  was  the  means  whereby  this  mad  foreign 
venture  was  to  be  accomplished.  It  was  decided 
that  Robert  Henley  was,  to  speak  vulgarly,  back 
ing  the  enterprise,  but  no  one  dared  display  curi 
osity  about  it  before  old  Robert's  face,  for  he  was 
wholesomely  feared  in  Croydon,  and  old  Robert 
showed  no  desire  to  gratify  the  public  thirst  in  the 
matter.  That  was  not  his  way. 

He  went  on  his  customary  round  as  he  had  done 
for  many  years.  If  his  thoughts  ever  strayed  afield 
trailing  after  young  David,  he  did  not  mention  the 
fact.  He  walked  about  his  garden;  he  ate  his 
solemn,  lonely  meals  in  the  great,  wainscoted  din 
ing-room  ;  he  sat  in  his  study,  where  the  air  smelled 
of  leather  and  sandal-wood,  translating  Anacreon, 
and  regularly  each  Wednesday  he  became  sombrely 
and  excessively  drunk  at  the  Eagle  Hotel,  and  was 
put  to  bed  by  the  ancient  William. 

Rosemary  came  upon  him  one  day  in  Main  Street. 
She  was  for  going  on  her  way  with  a  little,  grave 
bow,  but  old  Robert  stopped  her.  She  faced  him, 
attentive  but  unsmiling,  and  old  Robert  stood,  hat 

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in  hand,  looking  into  her  face  for  a  little  time  with 
out  words. 

"You  are  very,  very  beautiful,  my  dear!"  he 
said  at  last.  There  was  no  possibility  of  offence  in 
the  tone.  It  was  a  spontaneous  tribute  from  age 
to  youth  and  loveliness  and  charm.  "You  feel," 
said  old  Robert,  hesitatingly — "you  feel  bitterness 
towards  me  for  doing  what  I  have  done?" 

The  girl  shook  her  head,  saying:  "No,  no!  I 
want  him,"  said  she,  "to  have  everything  that 
will  help  him.  I  would  not  stand  in  his  way.  I 
love  him  too  much  for  that." 

"I  wonder  that  he  went!"  said  old  Robert,  un 
willingly.  "  I  wonder  that  he  went!" 

"If  it  is  wise,"  she  said,  "I  am  glad.  I  do  not 
care  about  myself.  It  is  only  Davie  who  matters." 

Old  Robert  regarded  her  soberly. 

"You  call  him  Davie?"  he  said,  and  a  flush  came 
into  the  girl's  cheeks. 

"It  is  wise!"  he  cried,  with  a  sudden  fierceness. 
His  yellow  fingers  twisted  and  shook  upon  the 
gold  head  of  the  stick  he  carried.  "He  must  see 
and  he  must  learn!"  said  the  old  man.  "  I  will  not 
have  him  bound  before  he  has  begun  to  grow!" 
His  pale,  tired  eyes  flashed  at  the  girl,  but  she  met 
them  calmly. 

"  I  have  not  tried  to  bind  him,"  she  said.  "  You 
took  him  from  me,  and  I  let  him  go  without  a  word. 
I  could  have  kept  him  here,  but  I  wouldn't." 

"And  yet  you  love  the  boy?"  demanded  Robert 
Henley. 

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She  looked  up  at  him  with  a  little,  white  smile, 
and  old  Robert's  eyes  dropped. 

"  I  ask  your  pardon!"  he  said,  in  another  tone.  A 
touch  of  color  came  up  into  his  lean  cheeks.  "You 
are  a  brave  child,"  he  said.  "  Beautiful  and  brave! 
Beautiful  and  brave!  David  has — lost  a  great  deal. 
I  wonder  if —  Ah,  well,  well!  I  bid  you  good-day, 
my  dear !  Try  not  to  think  ill  of  me.  I — I  am  very 
anxious  for  David's  welfare." 

He  bowed  low  over  the  girl's  hand  with  his  fine, 
old-time  manner,  and  went  on  his  way. 

Rosemary  saw  her  father  on  the  other  side  of  the 
street,  coming  up  for  his  morning  call  at  the  post- 
office,  and  she  went  to  join  him.  He  asked  her 
what  old  Robert  had  been  talking  to  her  about. 
She  answered  briefly  and  attempted  to  change  the 
subject,  but  her  father  came  back  to  Robert  Henley. 

' '  A  strange  man !  A  strange  man ! ' '  said  he,  shak 
ing  his  head.  "  Great  talents  gone  to  ruin — and  all 
through  a  good  woman!  Even  a  very  good  woman 
may  do  great  harm  in  this  odd  world,  Rose." 

The  girl  looked  at  him. 

"Who  was  the  woman?"  she  asked.  "I  have 
never  known." 

"Ah,  it  was  before  your  time,"  said  he.  "The 
woman  was  Marjory  Rivers — she  that  was  Marjory 
Coniston.  She  married  Jonathan  Rivers.  Young 
David,  who  went  abroad  the  other  day,  is  their 
son.  Robert  Henley  was  a  wild  boy — a  wild  boy, 
I  remember,  and  he  brought  back  reckless  habits 
from  his  travels  and  his  foreign  studies.  I  do  not 

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hold  too  much  by  travel  myself.  It  is  unsettling. 
Marjory  was  betrothed  to  Jonathan  Rivers  when 
Robert  returned  from  abroad.  It  was  said,  and 
we  all  believed,  that  Robert  tried  to  win  her  away, 
but  she  was  true  to  Jonathan  Rivers  and  married 
him.  Then  Robert  began  to  drink  heavily.  A  sad, 
sad  case!  I  wonder  he  has  lived  through  so  many 
years  of  intemperance." 

"They  say,"  said  the  girl,  "that  he  never  drinks 
at  home.  I  wonder  why." 

" I  believe,"  said  her  father,  "that  it  was  an  oath 
made  to  Marjory  Rivers.  Robert  was  in  the  habit 
of  giving  dinner-parties  and  other  entertainments 
at  his  house  in  those  days.  I  remember  the  last 
one  very  well.  It  was  more  than  twenty  years  ago. 
Marjory  Rivers  and  Jonathan  were  there  (they  had 
been  married  about  two  years),  and  your  mother 
and  I — possibly  a  dozen,  all  told.  Robert,  unfort 
unately,  drank  too  much  wine,  and  was,  perhaps, 
a  little  indiscreet.  At  any  rate,  Marjory  Rivers 
left  the  table  and  started  to  leave  the  house,  but 
Robert  followed  her  out  of  the  room  and,  it  is 
said,  took  a  solemn  oath  before  her  never  to  drink 
another  drop  of  any  intoxicating  beverage  in  that 
house.  I  fear  he  was  even  at  this  time  very  fond 
of  Marjory — very,  very  fond — and  he  kept  his  oath 
faithfully. 

"She  died  a  year  later,  shortly  after  Jonathan's 
death — we  all  believed  that  if  she  had  lived  she 
would  have  married  Robert — and  then  Robert  again 
took  to  drinking,  but  he  never  drinks* at  home." 

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Rosemary  walked  on  a  little  way  in  silence. 

"Ah,"  she  said  at  last,  "I  am  glad  to  know  that. 
That  explains  why  Mr.  Henley  is  so  fond  of  David." 

"Doubtless,  doubtless,"  said  her  father.  "Fur 
ther  than  that,  he  was,  of  course,  Jonathan's  execu 
tor,  but  I  believe  there  was  little  or  nothing  left. 
Robert  must  have  supported  young  David  and  put 
him  through  college  himself,  as  well  as  sent  him  on 
this  remarkable  foreign  journey." 

The  girl  gave  a  sudden  exclamation  of  surprise. 

"Oh,  I'm  sure  you  must  be  wrong!"  she  said, 
positively.  "David  has  about  a  thousand  dollars 
a  year  of  his  own,  from  his  father's  estate.  He  has 
told  me  so  more  than  once.  Mr.  Henley  has  the 
control  of  the  principal  until  David  is  thirty,  but 
he  has  advanced  David  some  of  it  for  this  tour." 

"That  must  be  some  extraordinary  fiction  of 
Robert  Henley's,"  said  the  man.  "  It  is  impossible 
that  it  should  be  true.  I  know  enough  about  Jona 
than  Rivers'  affairs  at  the  time  of  his  death  to  be 
sure  of  that.  Robert  is  a  strange  man;  he  does 
things  in  strange  ways." 

"If  that  is  true,"  said  Rosemary,  after  a  little 
pause,  "then  he  does  things  in  very  beautiful  ways." 

She  paused  at  the  gate  while  her  father  went  on 
into  the  house,  and  she  stared  across  the  street  and 
down  where  Robert  Henley's  mansard-roofs  rose 
above  the  trees. 

' '  Beautiful  ways, ' '  she  said  again  to  herself.  ' '  Oh, 
I'm  glad,  glad,"  she  said,  "that  there  are  two  of  us 
who  love  Da  vie!" 

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CHAPTER  V 

FOLLOWS  here  a  gap  of  two  years  and  a  half, 
or  thereabouts,  but  it  must  not  be  understood 
that  this  period  was  in  any  fashion  a  gap  in  David's 
life.  On  the  contrary,  it  was  one  of  the  fullest  and 
busiest  periods  of  his  career.  He  was  travelling 
about  England  and  on  the  Continent,  making  stops 
of  a  week  or  a  month  or  two  months,  or  even  more 
where  entertainment  promised,  or  where  God  had 
been  most  gracious  in  His  gifts,  or  where  man  had 
sought  out  the  most  engaging  of  his  inventions. 

He  bore  letters  from  old  Robert  Henley  to  cer 
tain  cousins  in  England  who  were  folk  of  impor 
tance,  and  these  good  people,  taking  a  great  fancy 
to  the  lad — David  was  likable;  he  could  be  very 
likable  when  he  chose — entertained  him  and  did 
much  for  him,  finally  sending  him  on  his  way  with 
more  letters  to  friends  in  other  lands.  So  he  wan 
dered  through  England  and  north  into  Scotland, 
where  he  was  in  time  for  the  grouse;  and  when 
colder  weather  came,  crossed  the  Channel,  bearing 
ever  south,  to  Paris  and  to  the  Midi  and  Provence, 
and  along  the  Riviera  into  Italy  and  across  the  sea 
to  Egypt.  And  with  another  spring  he  turned 
north  again,  through  Venice  into  the  Tyrol,  and 

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into  Switzerland  for  a  month  of  climbing,  thence  to 
Baden  and  Hamburg  and  Aix.  And  David's  eyes 
drank  their  fill  of  it  all.  He  had  the  seeing  eye  of 
the  born  artist.  Long  after  this  time  better  men 
than  he  were  used  to  curse  David  with  good-natured 
despair  because  they  said  he  could  stroll  through 
some  quaint  and  beautiful  old  town,  with  his  hands 
in  his  pockets  and  his  eyes  seemingly  on  the  ground 
— this  for  the  space  of  half  a  morning — and  then 
write  about  it  as  if  he  had  been  born  and  bred  there, 
as  if  the  mysterious  spirit  of  the  place  had  for  years 
been  the  breath  of  his  nostrils. 

Doubtless  this  was  the  grossest  exaggeration,  but 
it  is  also  beyond  doubt  that  David  had  a  power, 
little  short  of  the  miraculous,  for  absorbing  and 
remembering  those  things  about  places  or  people 
which  instinctively  he  knew  he  might  want  later  on. 
Unessentials  he  promptly  forgot — that  is  to  say, 
unessentials  to  his  peculiar  needs.  Also  he  forgot 
in  an  hour's  time  everything  in  the  nature  of  num 
bers,  such  as  historical  dates  or  the  dimensions  of 
buildings  or  the  population  of  towns,  and  all  his 
life  long  was  constantly  having  to  go  to  books  for 
these  things,  in  speechless  rage  at  his  impotence. 
He  had  had  to  be  coached  and  prodded  and  dragged 
through  the  very  elementary  mathematics  required 
at  his  school  and  in  the  first  year  of  college.  He 
used  to  say  sometimes  that  he  never  forgot  how 
places  looked  and  smelled,  but  that  it  was  impossi 
ble  for  him  to  remember  when  they  had  been  taken 
by  the  Saracens,  or  why. 

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So  both  capitals  and  waste  places  saw  him  brief 
ly  and  were  forever  photographed  upon  the  film 
of  his  picturing  memory.  He  had  a  winter  month 
in  Vienna  and  one  in  Petersburg.  He  heard  the 
midnight  mass  on  Christmas  Eve  in  St.  Eustache, 
and  took  a  part  in  the  r^veillon  after  it.  He  had 
a  May  in  London,  when  the  season- was  in  fullest 
flower,  and  spent  the  following  summer  drawing 
in  the  Julien  Atelier  in  the  Rue  du  Dragon,  under 
Jean  Paul  Laurens,  for  he  had,  like  many  writer- 
people,  a  by  no  means  despicable  talent  in  the 
sister  art,  which  he  had  more  or  less  trained  in 
America  at  the  college  art-school. 

And  as  the  lad  fed  his  eager  eyes  with  this  ever- 
changing,  ever-new  food,  and  stored  away  in  a  sure 
memory  people  and  scenes  and  wisdom  and  truth — 
the  spoil  of  old  empires;  as  the  shifting  months 
went  by  and  a  year  passed,  and,  in  its  time,  another 
year,  Croydon  and  the  old  life  there  came  to  seem 
very  faint  and  far-away  and  astonishingly  remote — 
a  sweet,  green  picture  haunted  by  old,  sweet  odors, 
as  of  heliotrope  and  thyme  and — rosemary. 

Rosemary!  A  slim  girl  in  white,  beautiful, 
Greek,  with  deep-blue  eyes,  looked  out  of  the  dim 
picture  at  David,  and  David  halted  in  his  course 
and  his  heart  smote  him. 

What  it  was  that  in  these  last  months  had  come 
between  them,  growing  slowly  from  a  breath  of 
nothingness  to  an  obscuring  cloud,  he  did  not 
know.  He  was  quite  honest  there.  He  really  did 
not  know,  though  that  may  have  been  because  the 

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other  David,  he  of  the  relentless  ambitions,  was 
leading  now — and  the  old  David,  whom  Rosemary 
had  loved,  was  become  a  passive  follower. 

That  spirit  of  bitterness  and  resentment  in  which 
he  had  left  Croydon  had  followed  him  across  the 
Atlantic,  and,  recurrently,  had  come  upon  him  for 
long  afterwards,  filling  him  with  a  fierce  hatred  of 
the  pleasant  things  and  the  hospitable  people  among 
whom  he  sojourned.  All  that  aching  homesickness 
which  commonly  attacks  the  maiden  voyager  con 
centrated  itself  with  David  into  an  agony  of  desire 
to  be  with  Rosemary — see  her  blue  eyes,  rest  in  the 
cool,  exquisite  sweetness  of  her.  In  those  days  he 
called  himself  very  hard  names  for  having  con 
sented  to  this  preposterous  bargain  of  exile.  He 
stood  bitterly  aghast  at  the  weakness  in  him  which 
had  yielded  to  old  Robert's — and  the  other  David's 
— pressure. 

But  the  lad  was  very,  very  young,  and  his  long- 
starved  soul  was  filling  itself  with  new  and  bound 
less  riches  —  dwelling  in  a  wonderland  whose  en 
chantments  seemed  without  end.  And  the  other 
David  must  not  be  forgotten.  It  is  far  from 
strange  that,  slowly,  imperceptibly,  Croydon  and 
the  old  life  there  became  to  him  a  dim,  sweet  pict 
ure,  and  even  Rosemary  a  memory  of  another 
existence. 

For  the  first  year  the  two  wrote  to  each  other 
more  or  less  regularly — Rosemary  more  and  David, 
the  wanderer,  it  must  be  admitted,  less.  But  there 
were  excuses  for  David.  And  even  through  a  part 

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of  the  second  year  they  wrote,  less  frequently ;  but 
an  imperceptible  change  had  begun,  an  ostentatious 
friendliness  had  crept  to  the  fore.  There  were 
fewer  reminiscences  of  the  old  days,  more  village 
gossip  on  Rosemary's  part,  more  guide-book  descrip 
tion  on  David's.  The  girl  must  have  been  suffering 
something  through  this  period.  She  had  no  new 
world  of  enchantment  to  fill  her  days,  as  David  had. 
But  if  she  suffered  she  was  still  about  it — that  would 
have  been  her  sweet  way.  She  answered  his  letters, 
echoed  faithfully  his  altered  spirit,  never  stretched 
an  appealing  hand  to  him  nor  uttered  a  hurt  cry. 
So  she  saw  him  slip  from  her,  as  inevitably  as  the 
day  pales  to  night,  until  at  last,  in  tender  shame  for 
them  both,  and  to  make  an  end  to  a  pitiful  matter, 
she  left  unanswered  one  of  David's  letters,  and  then, 
deliberately,  in  the  face  of  pain,  another.  So  David 
ceased  writing  and  the  thing  was  done. 


CHAPTER  VI 

DAVID  returned  to  America  in  the  autumn  of 
the  third  year.  He  had  left  Croydon  in  July, 
so,  of  his  bond  of  exile,  there  remained  still  to  be 
fulfilled  another  winter  and  spring. 

He  had  at  first  thought  to  spend  them  in  Paris, 
where,  in  that  untrammelled  and  altogether  delight 
ful  colony  of  the  Left  Bank,  a  little  circle  of  friends 
who  had  come  to  love  him  did  all  but  put  gyves  on 
his  wrists  and  ball  and  chain  to  his  ankles  by  way 
of  detaining  him;  but  an  unexpected  little  fore 
shadow  of  that  waiting  success  spurred  him  on  to 
the  battle-field — "to  be  a  soldier  'n'  fight." 

He  had  chanced  to  write,  a  little  before  this  time, 
three  short  stories,  very  light  and  trivial  in  char 
acter,  but  full  of  that  intimate  charm  which,  first 
and  last,  had  made  David's  work  what  it  was. 
They  had  to  do  with  the  American  abroad — the 
traveller  a,nd  the  exile,  viewed  satirically,  but 
withal  in  that  vein  of  sentiment  which  David  seems 
to  have  made  almost  his  peculiar  own.  The  field 
is  hackneyed  now,  but  at  this  time  it  was  compara 
tively  fresh.  The  other  writers  of  short  fiction  were 
struggling  either  with  the  various  sectional  phases 
of  American  life  or  with  an  astonished  and  amused 

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British  aristocracy.  So  David's  little  tales  —  the 
only  work  he  had  done  during  his  travels — possessed 
a  certain  freshness  of  theme  as  well  as  his  eternal 
freshness  of  treatment. 

He  had  sent  them,  but  half  in  earnest  and  with 
small  hope  of  success,  to  a  new  magazine  lately  born 
in  New  York — a  revolutionary  periodical  devoted 
exclusively  to  fiction,  the  avowed  sole  object  of 
which  was  to  entertain.  He  had  seen  copies  of  it 
in  London  and  in  Paris,  and  had  learned  that  it  was 
at  its  very  outset  springing  into  a  most  preposter 
ous  popularity. 

The  reply  came  to  him  in  about  a  month's  time, 
just  as  he  hung  poised  between  Paris  and  New  York. 
It  took  the  form  of  a  printed  slip  of  blue  paper  stat 
ing  formally  and  very  briefly  that  the  editors  of  the 
Gayety  Magazine  begged  to  report  that  Mr.  Rivers' 
three  manuscripts  had  been  accepted  for  publica 
tion,  and  that  a  check  in  payment  would  be  for 
warded  on  the  first  of  the  following  month.  En 
closed  with  this  announcement  was  a  personal  letter 
from  the  editor-in-chief,  saying  that  the  little  tales 
had  pleased  him  very  much  indeed,  and  that  Mr. 
Rivers  seemed  to  him  to  have  just  that  peculiar 
quality  of  style  which  he  most  ardently  desired  for 
his  magazine.  He  hoped  that  Mr.  Rivers  might 
find  it  convenient  to  favor  him  with  further  tales 
in  this  same  vein,  and  begged  him  to  call  at 
the  Gayety  office  if  he  should  ever  come  to  New 
York. 

David  gave  a  little,  nervous,  excited  laugh,  and 
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spread  the  slip  of  blue  paper  out  on  his  knees  to 
read  once  more  its  formal  message  of  good-fortune 
and  promise.  He  had  a  canny  streak  in  him,  had 
David,  and  he  was  far  too  sensible,  and  possessed 
far  too  much  humor,  to  be  misled  by  this  unlooked- 
for  windfall.  He  did  not,  as  many  other  young 
men  in  his  place  might  have  done,  construe  this  to 
mean  assured  success,  or  anything  remotely  like  it. 
But  it  was  a  foot  on  the  ladder.  Looking  upon  it 
in  all  coolness  of  judgment,  it  was,  he  said,  at  least 
a  foot  on  the  ladder. 

"And  the  rest,"  said  David,  "is  up  to  me." 

A  week  later  he  left  Paris  for  London,  and 
with  the  beginning  of  November  was  in  New 
York. 

By  midwinter  two  of  his  first  three  tales  had  ap 
peared  in  print,  three  more  had  been  written,  ac 
cepted  after  some  alterations,  and  the  lime-light  of 
popular  notice  was  beginning  to  play  upon  David, 
and  young  ladies  from  various  parts  of  the  United 
States  and  England  were  writing  to  him  to  tell  him 
how  well  he  understood  women.  (An  absurdity, 
for  he  did  not  understand  them  at  all.) 

He  had  settled  himself,  soon  after  his  arrival,  in 
an  old-fashioned  house  in  East  Seventeenth  Street, 
not  far  from  Stuyvesant  Square.  The  top  story  of 
the  house  was  divided  into  two  studio-apartments, 
one  in  front  and  one  in  the  rear.  David  took  the 
rear  apartment — a  large,  low-ceiled  room  with  a 
wide  north  light,  and  a  tiny  sleeping-room  opening 

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from  it.  The  unfashionable  location  of  the  place, 
and  the  fact  that  the  rooms  were  not  steam-heated 
but  had  to  be  warmed  from  fire-places,  made  the 
rentals  exceedingly  low.  David  paid  two  hundred 
dollars  for  a  six  months'  lease. 

He  had  written,  of  course,  to  old  Robert  Henley, 
telling  him  of  the  disposal  of  the  three  little  tales 
and  stating  his  intention  of  coming  to  New  York. 
And  old  Robert  had  replied,  offering  congratula 
tions  and  approval  of  the  plan.  Later  he  wrote 
that  he  might  find  it  convenient  in  the  early  spring 
to  spend  a  week  in  New  York,  and  would  look  for 
ward  to  seeing  David  then.  David  had  not  spoken 
of  Rosemary  in  his  letters — it  had  been  more  than 
six  months  now  since  the  interruption  of  their  cor 
respondence —  and  old  Robert  in  his  replies  never 
mentioned  her,  though  he  had  a  funny  little  stereo 
typed  phrase  with  which  he  always  ended:  "Your 
friends  here  are  all  well,  and  would,  I  am  sure,  beg 
me  to  convey  to  you  their  good  wishes,  did  they 
know  that  I  was  writing."  Beyond  that  single 
sentence  he  seldom  mentioned  the  folk  of  Croydon, 
unless  somebody  had  died,  in  which  case  he  pains 
takingly  reported  the  calamity. 

So,  at  the  very  beginning  of  his  labors,  David 
sprang  almost  without  effort  into  a  popularity 
which  most  writers  and  other  artists  attain  only 
after  years  of  steadfast  endeavor  and  disappoint 
ment — if  at  all.  This  is  not  to  say  that  the  popu 
larity  he  gained  was  a  very  worthy  or  important 


A    STUMBLING-BLOCK 

one.  Possibly  it  would  have  been  better  for  him 
in  the  end — for  his  artistic  growth — if  he  had  been 
compelled  to  work  harder,  to  suffer  more  keenly; 
but  David  seemed  fated  for  success,  even  though 
the  success  may  have  been  a  cheap  one.  Certainly 
fortune  favored  him.  Had  not  a  magazine  of  this 
new  and  peculiar  type  chanced  to  enter  upon  its 
career  of  brief  but  extraordinary  popularity  at  just 
this  time,  had  not  David's  vein  of  mingled  satire 
and  sentiment  chanced  to  be  the  vein  most  eager 
ly  desired  by  the  magazine,  his  climb  upward  must 
perforce  have  been  the  usual  slow  and  heart-break 
ing  ascent.  He  often  said  himself  that  circum 
stances  had  made  him. 

But  it  has  already  been  said  that  there  was  a 
canny  streak  in  the  lad.  He  was  much  too  wise  to 
leave  the  matter  in  the  hands  of  circumstances. 
He  worked  prodigiously.  These  early  stories  of  his 
burst  from  him  in  a  swift  and  unhesitating  flow 
(though  in  after  years  he  came,  like  all  the  writer 
tribe,  to  the  slow  and  painful  and  plodding  grind), 
but  after  their  first  draught  he  worked  over  them, 
polishing  and  perfecting,  and  nothing  left  his  hands 
which  he  could  improve. 

He  sent  two  or  three  tales  which  seemed  to  him 
rather  solider  and  more  important  than  the  others 
to  the  old  and  dignified  magazine  which  had  first 
introduced  him  to  print,  before  his  period  of  wan 
derings  ;  but  they  came  back,  not  with  those  printed 
slips  of  rejection  which  have  crushed  so  many  youth 
ful  ambitions,  but  with  very  brief  letters  from  the 

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editor  almost  as  impersonal  and  discouraging  as 
the  printed  slip  would  have  been. 

David  worried  a  great  deal  over  these;  they  hurt 
his  pride  in  proportion  as  his  success  in  the  lighter 
field  soothed  and  stimulated  it.  But  he  shook  his 
head  over  them  stubbornly. 

"Oh,  I'll  do  it  yet!"  he  said  to  himself.  "Just 
you  wait  a  bit!  1 11  do  it  yet.  I  feel  it  coming. " 

He  made  a  virtual  hermit  of  himself  in  this  first 
winter.  It  was  not  difficult  for  him,  because  he  had 
always  been,  by  inclination,  a  rather  solitary  lad, 
partly  through  shyness  and  partly  because  he 
heartily  enjoyed  that  fanciful  world  in  which  he 
dwelt  when  quite  alone.  Imaginative  people  are 
almost  always  solitary  by  inclination. 

His  sudden  leap  into  inconsiderable  celebrity 
had  led  many  of  his  college-mates  who  lived  in  New 
York  to  hunt  him  out,  offering  him  entertainment; 
but  David,  in  so  far  as  he  could,  held  aloof,  saying 
wisely  that  these  things  could  wait  and  that  for 
the  present  he  could  not  afford  friends.  He  was,  as 
has  been  said,  a  prodigious  writer.  He  came  fresh 
to  it  from  a  long  period  of  literary  inaction.  He  was 
like  a  clock,  wound  up  by  his  years  of  wandering 
and  observation.  It  would  take  him  a  long  while 
to  run  down. 

So  he  wrought  both  day  and  night  in  his  top- 
story  studio,  and  fed  himself  inexpensively  at  the 
cheaper  restaurants,  French  and  Italian,  where  he 
sat  over  his  coffee  and  tobacco  late  into  the  evening, 
solitary  in  the  midst  of  the  squalid  many,  breathing 

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the  hot,  smoky,  over-used  air  into  his  lungs  the 
while  his  eager  fancy  dwelled — as  Harkness  would 
have  said — in  moonlight  and  gardens,  among  youth 
ful  lovers  and  first  kisses  and  all  such  delectable 
things. 


CHAPTER  VII 

IN  March  Robert  Henley  carried  out  his  promise. 
He  did  not  tell  David  that  he  was  coming,  but 
suddenly  appeared  one  day  as  from  the  clouds.  He 
installed  himself  at  a  certain  old-fashioned  hotel 
in  Union  Square,  where  in  his  infrequent  visits  to 
New  York  he  had  always  lived,  and  on  the  after 
noon  of  his  arrival  climbed  David's  three-pair-back 
and  knocked  at  the  door. 

David,  looking  up  from  a  litter  of  work,  gave  a 
shout  of  astonishment  and  welcome  as  the  old  gen 
tleman  entered.  Robert,  as  if  to  do  honor  to  the 
occasion,  was  buttoned  into  a  perfectly  new  frock- 
coat,  albeit  of  the  customary  strange  antiquity  of 
design.  He  wore  a  perfectly  new  hat  of  a  rakish 
modernity  which  ill  accorded  with  the  sober  coat; 
he  had  a  flower  in  his  button- hole,  and  his  hands 
displayed  white  gloves  with  black  stitching.  Be 
fore  his  right  eye  gleamed  an  eye-glass  which  David 
remembered  as  usually  depending  upon  its  broad 
ribbon  from  the  wearer's  neck.  He  had  never  be 
fore  seen  it  in  place.  Altogether  Robert  appeared 
a  very  spruce  and  knowing  old  gentleman.  David 
gasped  at  him. 

"You've  been  getting  married!"  he  accused  at 
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last,  and,  as  man  to  man,  thumped  old  Robert  upon 
his  dignified  chest. 

Robert  emitted  a  rakish  chuckle.  "Not  I,  my 
boy,  not  I!"  he  said,  fixing  the  glass  more  firmly. 
"Too  old  a  bird  altogether.  Just  spruced  up  a  bit 
to  look  right,  that's  all.  It  doesn't  matter  what 
you  wear  in  Croydon.  Go  about  in  pajamas  if  you 
like.  Nobody  knows  the  difference.  New  York's 
another  thing  —  another  thing  altogether.  Come 
here!  I  want  to  have  a  look  at  you." 

He  drew  David  under  the  light  of  the  big  north 
window,  and  holding  him  by  the  shoulders  regarded 
him  anxiously.  David  laughed,  and  presently  the 
old  man  nodded  his  head. 

"No  harm  done,"  said  he,  "and  a  good  deal  of 
good.  You've  acquired  a  new  jaw,  David,  my  lad. 
There's  more  solidity  there  than  there  used  to  be. 
New  eyes,  too.  Dear  me!  Dear  me! 

"I  didn't  know,"  he  said;  "sometimes  I  wasn't 
sure  about  the  wisdom  of  sending  a  boy  off  alone 
to  Europe  with  no  let  or  check  on  him.  It  was  a 
risk.  European  life  is  full  of  temptations,  David. 
At  least,"  he  added,  reflectively,  "it  used  to  be  full 
of  them  in  my  time." 

David  flushed  a  bit. 

"Oh,  well,"  said  he,  "I'm  not  a  beast — though 
I'm  not  a  prig,  either."  (Which  was  quite  true.) 
"Besides,  I  was  much  too  busy  to  bother  with 
temptations.  I'm  an  honest  working-man  now, 
sir." 

"Yes,  yes,  quite  so,"  said  old  Robert.  "So  I 
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understand.  We  must  have  a  long  talk  over  that." 
He  turned  to  David's  table  where  a  half -finished 
manuscript  lay  in  untidy  heaps  with  a  batch  of 
galley-proofs  scattered  about  it. 

"This  your  work?"  said  old  Robert,  poking  gin 
gerly  at  it  with  his  stick. 

"  That's  an  unfinished  story,"  said  David.  "  It's 
going  to  be  a  rather  good  one,  too — for  me,  that  is. 
Do  you  read  my  tales  in  the  Gayety,  Uncle  Robert?" 

"Ye-es,  David,"  said  old  Robert.  "Yes,  I  read 
them."  He  looked  a  little  embarrassed. 

"I'm  afraid  they  are  a  bit  out  of  my  line,  David," 
he  said,  in  the  anxious  tone  of  one  who  would  not 
for  worlds  give  offence. 

"  I — it's  a  long  time  since  I've  read  any  fiction  of 
just  that  sort,"  he  said.  "I'm  a  bit  too  old  and 
crusty  for  it.  But  I  have  no  doubt  that  it  is  very 
good.  I'm  told  so  by  many  people.  Yes,  they 
tell  me  your  stories  are  excellent.  Of  course  I  my 
self  can  see  that  the  style  is  excellent.  You've 
made  an  extraordinary  beginning." 

"Oh,  well,  I Ve  had  great  luck, ' '  said  David.  ' ' It 
all  comes  of  one  editor  man's  happening  to  fancy 
my  peculiar  type  of  nonsense."  He  pushed  old 
Robert  into  a  chair  and  took  his  hat  from  him. 
"And  don't  you  worry,"  he  said,  "about  the  kind 
of  tales  I  publish  nowadays.  They're  making  a 
sort  of  name  for  me;  and,  besides,  I'll  be  hanged  if 
they're  altogether  bad,  in  their  way!  No,  I'll  be 
hanged  if  they  are!  Before  long  I  shall  graduate 
from  this  school  and  do  more  serious  stuff — when 

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they'll  let  me.  I'm  written  up  long  ahead  of  pub 
lication  already.  Let's  see!  There  are  nine  tales 
finished  and  accepted,  and  a  sort  of  novelette  thing 
half  done.  That's  not  a  bad  record,  so  far,  if  quan 
tity's  anything.  I've  had  my  wages  raised,  too. 
I  shall  be  supporting  myself  in  ostentatious  luxury 
before  you  know  it,  Uncle  Robert." 

Robert  Henley  waved  a  protesting  hand. 

"Don't  worry  about  the  money  end  of  it,"  he 
said;  "that  will  take  care  of  itself.  I  don't  want 
you  to  worry  about  money.  Your  mind  should  be 
free  of  that  if  you  are  to  do  good  work.  I  wish  you 
might  write  a  book,  David!  I  should  like  to  see 
your  work  between  covers.  A  magazine  is  a  very 
fleeting  thing — almost  as  ephemeral  as  a  newspa 
per.  I  wish  you  might  write  a  book." 

David  nodded  an  eager  head  at  him. 

"  That's  why  I  am  rushing  all  this  short  stuff  so!" 
said  he.  "I  have  a  book  in  my  head — a  fine,  fine 
one,  if  I  only  can  do  it!  Jove,  if  only  I  can!  But 
I've  got  to  get  away  from  here  to  work  it  out — quite 
away,  away  from  everything.  I  want  to  go  some 
where  this  summer  where  I  shall  be  entirely  alone — 
a  desert  island  is  really  what  I  want.  Not  even 
Croydon  will  do.  Too  many  people  I  know  there. 
I  can  do  this  thing  in  three  months  if  it  goes  well, 
and  it  '11  be  a  good  book,  Uncle  Robert!  Even  you 
will  like  it." 

Old  Robert's  pale  eyes  gleamed  with  delight.  He 
smote  his  knees  with  his  two  white-gloved  hands. 

" That's  right,  my  lad!"  said  he.  "That's  right. 
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That's  what  I  should  like  best  to  have  you  do. 
These  little  tales  of  yours — I  have  no  doubt  that  they 
are  excellent,  but  they  won't  last — they  won't  last. 
I  want  to  see  your  name  on  my  book-shelves.  I'd 
rather  see  it  than  my  own,  by  gad!  We're  going 
to  make  a  great  man  of  you,  David.  It  may  re 
quire  time — it  generally  does — but  I  hope  to  live 
to  see  it." 

David  laughed  gently. 

"I  hope  I  may  live  to  see  it,  too,  Uncle  Robert," 
he  said,  "but  I  don't  know.  That's  a  big  order. 
I  shall  do  some  good  work  though,  some  day.  I'm 
quite  sure  of  that — in  fact,  I'm  determined  upon  it. 
So  don't  lose  patience  with  me  if  I  fail  to  achieve 
greatness.  Greatness  is  so  very  rare!" 

Then  from  that  they  fell  to  talking  of  David's 
travels,  and  to  comparing  notes  upon  certain  of  the 
places  which  they  both  loved,  David  from  recent 
acquaintance  and  old  Robert  from  ancient  memory. 
And  after  an  hour  Robert  went  back  to  his  hotel 
to  dress,  for  he  was  to  dine  out  with  David. 

They  dined  at  a  new  restaurant  which  had  just 
emerged,  brave  in  gilt  and  red  plush,  from  the  grave 
of  an  old  building,  and  old  Robert,  in  his  quaint 
dress-coat,  with  gray  hair  brushed  rakishly  forward 
over  his  ears  and  eye-glass  screwed  into  place,  visibly 
dropped  the  age  from  his  shoulders  as  he  looked 
round  the  gayly  lighted  room,  and  heard  the  music 
and  the  chatter  of  people  whose  clothes  were  almost 
too  beautiful,  and  who  seemed  to  have  no  troubles 
in  the  world  beyond  the  pain  of  having  to  decide 

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whether    they    wished   their   asparagus   hot   with 
sauce  Hollandaise  or  cold  with  sauce  vinaigrette. 

A  touch  of  color  came  up  into  his  lean  cheeks  and 
an  old-time  gleam  to  his  pale-blue  eye.  He  nodded 
gravely  across  the  table,  where  David,  in  real 
French  that  was  not  got  out  of  a  book,  was  confer 
ring  with  the  waiter.  (Truth  to  tell,  old  Robert 
was  rather  impressed  by  that  French,  his  own  being 
of  a  strictly  classical  and  bookish  nature.) 

"An  interesting  establishment,  David!"  he  said. 
"Very — er — gay  and — animated.  I  don't  know 
when  I  have  seen  so  many  attractive  young  ladies 
in  one  room  at  the  same  time." 

David,  in  the  role  of  host,  shrugged  a  deprecatory 
shoulder. 

"Oh  yes,"  he  said,  "they're  very  attractive  to 
look  at.  Most  of  them  are  theatrical  chorus  ladies 
at  present  disengaged ;  and  the  others  are  ladies 
from  Kansas  City  and  Omaha  who  are  perfectly 
and  harmlessly  happy  in  the  delusion  that  they  are 
surrounded  by  the  exclusive  great  of  New  York 
City.  Sometimes  they  ask  the  mattre  d' hotel,  and 
he  always  points  out  the  one  they're  looking  for." 

Old  Robert  emitted  a  pleased  chuckle  and  tore 
his  attention  from  a  large,  kind  lady  in  diamonds 
whom  he  had  been  ogling. 

"Eh,  what?"  he  demanded.  "I  didn't  get  all 
that,  David.  My — er — attention  had  been  divert 
ed.  Yes,  diverted.  It  occurs  to  me  that  many  of 
these  ladies  whom  I  see  about  me  are  almost  too 
beautiful  to  be  true.  Am  I  right?" 

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"You  are,"  said  David.  "They're  much  too 
beautiful  to  be  true — for  very  long." 

"Then  they  are  not  quite  of  the  haute  monde?" 
asked  Robert,  returning  to  the  large,  kind  lady 
with  the  diamonds. 

"  No,  sir,"  said  David,  "  not  altogether.  You  see, 
this  isn't  London.  It's  not  smart  here  to  dine  in 
public  restaurants.  In  fact,  I  see  no  one  at  all  who 
doesn't  belong  either  to  the  chorus  or  to  the  Kansas 
City  classes." 

"There  is  one  party,"  observed  old  Robert,  "sit 
ting  at  that  round  table  near  the  centre  of  the  room — 
they  are  behind  you ;  you  must  turn  to  see  them — 
which  seems  to  me  quite  different  from  the  rest. 
They  have  another  air.  I  should  think  they  proba 
bly  are  entirely  genteel"  (old  Robert's  phraseology 
was  sometimes  charmingly  unique)  "and  have  come 
here  to  look  on  at  the — the  game,  as  it  were." 

David  twisted  about  in  his  chair  to  see,  and  gave 
a  little  laugh  of  surprise  and  pleasure. 

"Oh,  it's  the  Harry  Farings!"  he  said.  "I  know 
them  very  well.  I  sometimes  dine  at  their  house. 
Do  you  mind  if  I  go  over  for  a  moment  to  speak  to 
them  ? ' '  Old  Robert  nodded  graciously,  and  watch 
ed  the  lad  as  he  threaded  his  way  across  the  room 
among  the  crowded  tables  to  where  his  friends  sat. 
He  saw  him  greet  the  woman  who  was  evidently 
the  hostess  of  the  party — a  young  woman  of  a  very 
regal  and  majestic  type  of  beauty.  He  saw  him 
shake  hands  with  two  of  the  men,  bow  to  the  others 
at  the  table,  and  finally  cross  over  to  greet  a  young- 
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er  woman  than  Mrs.  Faring,  a  very  tall  and  slen 
der  woman  who  might  be  anywhere  from  five-and- 
twenty  to  thirty.  Old  Robert,  while  David  stood 
for  a  moment  talking  to  this  lady,  regarded  her 
closely,  for  it  seemed  to  him  that  she  represented 
almost  the  extreme  of  a  certain  very  modern  type 
which  he  disliked — a  type  which  in  his  earlier  days 
had  not  existed. 

Then  David  returned  and  dropped  into  his  chair 
with  a  word  of  apology  for  his  absence. 

"They  are  very  delightful  people,  the  Parings," 
said  he.  "They  are  almost  the  only  people  I 
know,  in  their  walk  of  life,  who  are  entirely  and 
blissfully  happy.  It's  rare.  Commonly  you  must 
go  to  the  poor  and  obscure  for  real  happiness.  So 
long  as  the  Farings  exist  I  shall  remain  a  stubborn 
optimist.  Without  them  it  would  be  difficult.  And 
I  hug  my  optimism,  too.  I  should  hate  to  be  robbed 
of  it.  Mrs.  Faring  is  very  beautiful,  is  she  not?" 

"Yes — yes!"  said  old  Robert,  absently.  "Yes; 
very  beautiful.  And  good,  also,  I  think.  That  is 
rare,  too."  He  dropped  his  eye-glass  with  a  sudden 
contortion  and  frowned  across  the  room  towards 
the  party  at  the  round  table. 

"Who  is  the  other  lady?"  he  demanded.  "The 
younger  one,  with  whom  you  shook  hands?" 

' '  Ah ! ' '  said  David ; ' '  that  was  very  odd — her  being 
here  with  the  Farings  to-night — very  odd,  indeed. 
She  is  a  Miss  Winter — Violet  Winter.  I  met  her  a 
year  ago  in  London —  No,  more  than  a  year.  It  was 
during  the  season.  I  was  dining  with  some  people 

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one  Sunday  night  at  the  Savoy,  and  she  was  with 
another  party  at  the  next  table.  Our  people  were 
friends,  and  so  I  met  her.  I  had  heard  of  her  before, 
and  I  Ve  often  heard  of  her  since.  Every  one  knows 
her  and  seems  to  admire  her  very  much.  I  don't 
know  whether  I  do  myself  or  not.  She  seems  to 
be  a  rather  odd  sort  of  person.  She's  an  American 
girl,  but  she  has  lived  almost  all  her  life  abroad  at 
various  capitals  because  her  father  was  in  the  dip 
lomatic  service.  I  don't  know  where  he  is  now. 
People  seem  a  bit  vague  about  him.  Anyhow,  this 
girl  is  a  singularly  independent  creature  and  goes 
about  quite  alone  with  only  a  maid.  She's  account 
ed  very  clever,  and  so  people  like  to  have  her  about. 
She  has  made  a  great  success  everywhere,  I  believe, 
but  she  seems  not  to  care  to  marry.  She's  a  type — 
rather.  She's  a  type  of  the  exceedingly  modern 
young  woman — fin  de  siecle — or,  rather,  commence 
ment  de  siecle.  She  appears  to  have  seen  every 
thing  and  known  everything  and  done  almost 
everything.  And  she  looks  a  bit  tired  of  it  all, 
too.  I  don't  wonder.  What's  left  for  her?  Oh 
yes,  she's  a  type!" 

David  laughed,  but  the  elder  man  would  not 
smile  in  response.  He  looked  across  the  crowded 
restaurant  to  the  girl  who  sat  with  David's  friends, 
and  his  heavy  gray  eyebrows  bristled  in  a  frown. 

"Keep  away  from  over  -  experienced  and  tired 
and  discontented  women!"  he  said,  very  gravely. 
"They're  the  devil,  David!  —  they're  the  very 
devil!" 

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"I  sha'n't  forget  that,  sir,"  said  David.  He 
affected  a  gravity  that  he  did  not  feel,  for  he  saw 
that  old  Robert  was  rather  absurdly  disturbed. 

"She  interests  me  only  as  a  type,"  he  said. 
"She  is  such  a  very  extreme  case.  Do  you  think 
she  is  handsome  ?  Some  people  consider  her  beau 
tiful.  I'm  reserving  judgment  myself.  Certainly 
she  hasn't  the  sort  of  beauty  that  I  most  admire." 

His  face  twisted  suddenly  as  he  spoke,  for  with 
the  words  had  come  before  him  in  a  swift  flash  a 
vision  of  the  beauty  by  which  instinctively  he  com 
pared  the  beauty  of  all  other  women,  and  before 
which,  one  and  all,  they  paled  into  insignificance. 
However  little  Rosemary  might  come  to  be  to  him, 
however  little  she  might  enter  into  his  life,  he  knew 
very  well  that  the  beauty  and  loveliness  of  her,  the 
sweetness  that  was  half  divine,  could  never  quite 
pass  from  him  or  be  forgotten.  It  seemed  that  the 
picture  of  her,  the  sound  of  her  voice,  remained 
somewhere  within  him,  subconscious  but  ever  pres 
ent.  Sometimes  they  came  before  him  in  a  swift 
and  blinding  flash  —  sometimes  they  came,  very 
sweetly,  in  dreams,  half  remembered  upon  waking 
— sometimes  when,  like  all  imaginative  people,  he 
had  been  for  hours  together  wrung  by  that  vague 
and  restless  fever  which  we  call  weltschmerz ;  not 
knowing  what  it  is,  the  fever  would  die  from  him 
slowly,  soothed  by  a  very  beautiful  peace  as  vague 
as  the  pain,  and  all  at  once  the  peace  would  be 
made  clear  to  him  and  it  would  be  —  Rosemary 
whom  he  had  lost. 

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Old  Robert  nodded  a  slow  and  grudging  head. 

"I  suppose  she  is  handsome  in  her  lean  fashion," 
he  said,  as  one  who  must  yield  the  devil  his  due. 
"Doubtless  she  understands  her  type  and  dresses 
it  well.  I  expect  an  artist  would  admire  her.  / 
do  not,  and  I  sincerely  hope  you  agree  with  me." 

David  changed  the  subject,  for  it  seemed  to  him 
that  the  old  gentleman  rather  childishly  clung  to 
his  point.  So  they  talked  of  other  things,  and 
towards  ten  o'clock  finished  a  very  pleasant  din 
ner,  and  afterwards  went  on  to  David's  rooms  to 
sit  late  into  the  night  over  their  respective  pipe 
and  cigar.  They  spoke  a  little  of  Croydon  and  of 
some  of  the  recent  changes  there — deaths  for  the 
most  part.  Croydon  changes  only  to  become  eter 
nal.  But  as  if  by  common  instinct  the  two  avoid 
ed  that  one  subject  which  each  must  have  known 
to  be  in  the  other's  mind.  Old  Robert  did  not 
mention  Rosemary,  and  something  within  David 
stilled  his  tongue  when  he  would  have  asked.  In 
the  end  David  walked  with  his  guest  to  the  hotel 
in  Union  Square,  and  left  him  after  making  an 
appointment  for  the  next  day. 

Thereafter  the  lad,  for  a  breath  of  air  before 
sleeping,  walked,  under  the  bright  stars,  down 
across  the  square  to  Fourteenth  Street  and  so  to 
University  Place  and  on  into  Washington  Square. 
He  had  been,  this  evening,  to  an  unusual  degree, 
lifted  out  of  himself  and  out  of  that  mimic  world 
of  his  brain's  creations  in  which  for  the  past  months 
he  had  so  steadfastly  dwelt.  Old  Robert's  coming, 

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and  the  atmosphere  of  Croydon,  which  of  necessity 
came  with  him,  had  brought  up  pictures  long  grown 
dim  in  the  face  of  a  nearer,  more  vivid  world.  And, 
added  to  this,  the  chance  meeting  with  that  odd 
young  woman,  Violet  Winter,  stirred  David  sur 
prisingly.  He  awoke  with  a  dull  amazement  to  the 
realization  that  his  mind  had  been  busy  with  her 
all  the  evening  since  dinner-time.  It  must  be,  he 
thought,  that  there  was  some  odd  and  potent  charm 
in  the  girl  which  affected  all  who  met  her — some 
magnetism  quite  beyond  computing.  He  had  been 
quite  honest  in  saying  to  old  Robert  that  she  had 
not  the  type  of  beauty  which  he  most  admired. 
He  might,  as  honestly,  have  gone  much  further  and 
said  that  she  had  not  the  type  of  personality  which 
he  most  admired.  But  she  was  undeniably  very 
clever  and  stimulating.  Certainly,  he  thought, 
there  must  be  something  about  her  or  she  would 
not  be  so  easily  and  assuredly  popular  among  so 
many  different  sets  of  people. 

Beatrix  Faring  had  asked  David,  in  that  moment 
in  the  restaurant,  to  dine  with  them  at  home  on  the 
following  Sunday  evening,  saying  that  there  would 
be  a  few  people  there  whom  he  was  sure  to  like,  and 
as  he  tramped  the  deserted  alleys  of  Washington 
Square  he  found  himself  wondering  if  Miss  Winter 
was  to  be  among  them. 

Still,  though  these  passing  things  might  claim 
him  for  a  little  time,  the  other  David,  the  jealous 
artificer,  was  uppermost  in  these  days;  and  as  he 
turned  north  and  east  to  tramp  home  through  the 

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night  his  mind  leaped  keen  and  eager  to  the  great 
book  which  was  to  come,  and  the  brave  and  gentle 
folk  who  were  to  move  and  have  their  being  in  it. 
In  the  face  of  this,  those  paler,  lesser  folk  who 
walked  their  insignificant  ways  in  their  paltry, 
insignificant  world  of  reality  dimmed  away  from 
him  into  the  night  and  were  quite  forgotten. 


CHAPTER  VIII 

OLD  Robert  Henley  returned  to  Croydon  on 
Saturday,  after  what  he  professed  to  have 
been  an  altogether  delightful  week.  He  had 
divided  his  time  between  David  and  certain  an 
cient  cronies  of  his  whom  he  saw  only  on  his  rare 
visits  to  New  York,  and  with  whom  he  never 
exchanged  letters  save  once  a  year — at  Christmas 
time. 

David  had  been  a  bit  nervous  about  Wednesday, 
remembering  that  day  as  the  one  upon  which  old 
Robert  invariably  fell  from  grace — if  so  regular  and 
deliberate  an  affair  might  be  termed  a  fall — and 
became  very  tight.  But  as  it  turned  out,  his  alarm 
was  quite  groundless  in  so  far  as  any  danger  or 
possibility  of  disgrace  was  concerned,  for  with  the 
morning  of  that  day  old  Robert  shut  himself  up 
and  was  refused  to  all  calls  either  by  person  or 
telephone.  Whether  he  became  drunk  or  not 
David  never  knew,  and  the  management  of  the 
hotel,  which  knew  Robert  Henley  of  old,  held  its 
tongue.  At  noon  of  Thursday  the  old  gentleman 
was  again  abroad  in  his  perfectly  new  coat,  his 
rakish  hat,  and  a  crimson  flower  in  his  button 
hole. 

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So  at  length  he  departed,  and  David  was  left  alone 
again  to  his  labors  and  his  dreams.  But  on  Sunday 
night  he  dined,  as  he  had  arranged,  with  the  Harry 
Farings,  who  spent  a  part  of  their  winters  in  town 
in  a  very  pretty  little  house  in  Thirty-seventh  Street, 
just  out  of  Madison  Avenue.  David,  since  the  even 
ing  was  fine,  walked  up,  shortly  before  eight,  from 
his  quarters  in  Seventeenth  Street.  Some  one  was 
just  getting  out  of  a  hansom  before  the  door  as  he 
reached  the  house,  and  as  the  two  stood  a  moment 
in  the  light,  waiting  for  the  door  to  be  opened,  David 
recognized  the  other  guest  for  the  veteran  editor, 
Cowper,  who  nearly  three  years  before  had  written 
him  the  letter  which  definitely  set  him  upon  his 
path.  He  knew  the  white  head  and  beard  and  the 
kindly  old  face  from  photographs.  He  had  a  swift 
impulse  to  speak  and  introduce  himself,  but  his  ha 
bitual  shyness  combated  that,  and  while  he  hesitated 
the  heavy  door  of  bronze  and  glass  swung  open  and 
they  went  in. 

It  seemed  that  they  were  the  last  arrivals,  for 
when  they  had  left  their  hats  and  coats  with  the 
footmen,  and,  at  the  foot  of  the  stairs,  the  butler 
had  offered  them  their  dinner-cards,  there  were  but 
two  of  the  little  envelopes  on  the  tray.  The  elder 
man,  in  taking  his,  seemed  to  have  eyed  the  other, 
for  he  swung  about  towards  David  with  a  quizzical 
smile. 

"You  are  Mr.  David  Rivers,  I  take  it,"  he  said, 
and  held  out  his  hand.     "My  name  is  Cowper. 
We  have  had  some  slight  correspondence." 
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David  flushed  under  the  twinkle  of  the  old  gen 
tleman's  eye. 

"  Oh  yes,  sir!"  said  he.  "I  recognized  you  outside 
the  door,  as  we  came  in,  and  I  wanted  to  introduce 
myself,  but  I  was  afraid  you'd  think  it  a  bit  cheeky, 
so  I  didn't.  And  besides,"  he  said,  with  a  little 
grin,  "I've  put  you  to  so  much  anguish  of  late  that 
I  was  afraid  you'd  refuse  to  have  anything  to  do 
with  me." 

The  elder  man  laughed. 

"Oh,  it's  an  anguish  I  can  bear,"  he  said.  "I'm 
sorry  to  have  had  to  put  you  to  so  much  return 
suffering,  but  I  see  and  hear  that  you  find  consola 
tion  elsewhere."  He  shook  a  humorously  disap 
proving  head  at  David.  "They'll  spoil  you,  my 
boy,"  he  said — "  they'll  spoil  you.  It  isn't  in  human 
nature  not  to  be  spoiled  by  that  sort  of  thing.  Now 
/  should  have  succeeded  in  keeping  you  properly 
humble  and  subdued.  That  abominable  periodical 
of  yours  has  ruined  one  of  my  pet  plans." 

The  butler  coughed  appealingly  behind  his  hand, 
from  half-way  up  the  stairs,  and  the  two  moved  after 
him.  The  elder  man,  as  they  went,  took  hold  upon 
David's  arm  and  gave  it  a  friendly  squeeze. 

"It's  all  your  wretched  facility,  you  know,"  he 
complained.  "  I  warned  you  against  that  long  ago. 
I  told  you  to  guard  against  it — but  did  my  wisdom 
save  you?  Not  at  all!  I'm  a  crabbed  old  codger 
who  has  forgotten  what  the  Garden  of  Eden  is  like. 
Egad,  the  young  ladies  haven't,  though!" 

He  gave  David's  arm  a  final  kindly  squeeze  as 
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they  reached  the  top  of  the  stairs,  and  they  went  in 
where  the  other  guests  were  waiting. 

David  hastily  looked  at  the  card  in  his  little 
envelope,  and  found  that  he  was  to  take  in  Miss 
Winter.  He  gave  a  sudden  laugh  of  sheer  amuse 
ment,  and  Beatrix  Faring,  as  she  greeted  him, 
asked  him  what  was  funny. 

"I  was  laughing  at  something  which  is  called 
fate,  my  dear  lady,"  said  David,  cryptically. 

"Well,  don't  you  do  it!"  said  Mrs.  Faring. 
"You're  much  too  young — and  nice.  Leave  that 
sort  of  thing  to  Violet  Winter.  You're  to  take  her 
in,  by  -  the  -  way,  aren't  you  ?  Violet  is  given  to 
laughing  at  fate,  as  well  as  at  most  other  things, 
and  I  hate  it  in  her.  Who  was  that  beautiful  old 
man  I  saw  you  with  the  other  night?" 

David  told  her,  and  then  turned  away  to  find  his 
dinner  companion.  She  was  at  the  farther  end  of 
the  room  talking  to  Harry  Faring,  who  left  her  as 
David  came  up  and  went  towards  a  little  group  of 
the  other  guests,  smiting  the  younger  man  a  friend 
ly-clap  upon  the  shoulder  as  he  went. 

The  girl  gave  David  her  hand,  smiling  a  little, 
and  regarding  him  out  of  narrowed  eyes  as  she 
regarded  all  the  world.  Old  Robert  Henley  had 
been  right  in  his  venture  that  Miss  Winter  under 
stood  her  type  and  dressed  it  well,  only  the  phrase 
was  inadequate.  She  dressed  it  faultlessly,  and 
with  an  art  which  argued  either  the  inspiration  of 
something  like  genius  or  the  result  of  much  pains 
taking  study,  for  the  long  and  clinging  and  sweep- 


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ing  lines  of  drapery  round  her  turned  her  exceeding 
slenderness  into  a  sinuous  grace  which  was  really 
remarkable.  She  was  much  too  thin,  but  the  thin 
ness  was  not  angular,  for  she  was  at  this  time  an 
uncommonly  perfect  type  of  fausse  maigre,  and  she 
walked  and  moved  well. 

She  had,  as  might  be  expected,  a  long  and  very 
slender  neck,  but  much  care  and  treatment  had 
made  the  slim  lines  of  it  good  lines — delightful  to  a 
painter  or  sculptor — and  her  head  was  poised  upon 
it  admirably.  A  popular  young  English  actress 
had,  just  before  this  time,  introduced  a  semi-Rus 
sian  mode  of  coiffure,  with  braids  of  hair  wound 
round  and  round  the  head,  and  Miss  Winter  had 
once  more  shown  excellent  judgment  in  appropriat 
ing  this  fashion  to  her  own  use.  It  became  her 
well. 

All  in  all,  she  might  have  borne  out,  to  the  fullest 
extent,  the  claim  of  certain  of  her  friends  that  she 
was  very  beautiful,  but  for  the  one  matter  of  ex 
pression.  Her  face  bore  always  a  look  of  fatigue 
(which  was  doubtless  partly  physical)  and  of  ex 
treme  nervousness,  and,  at  most  times,  of  discon 
tent. 

At  the  present  moment,  however,  she  looked,  in 
so  far  as  she  was  capable  of  it,  distinctly  pleased. 

"I  hope  you're  not  cursing  your  luck  for  having 
to  sit  next  me  to-night,"  she  said  to  David,  "for  I 
myself  am  really  very  glad.  I've  been  becoming 
most  interested  in  you  during  these  past  months, 
even  though  we  haven't  seen  each  other.  Why 

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didn't  you  tell  me  in  London,"  she  demanded, 
humorously,  "  that  you  were  a  celebrity  ?" 

"Because,"  said  David,  grinning,  "I  hardly 
ventured,  on  so  short  an  acquaintance,  to  tell  you 
lies." 

"Why  didn't  you  tell  me  you  were  going  to  be 
come  one,  then?"  she  said.  "I  was  intensely 
excited  when  I  first  began  to  see  your  stories  in 
print.  I  recognized  your  name  and  who  you  were 
at  once;  the  Eversleys  had  told  me  so  many  nice 
things  about  you  that  evening  when  we  first  met 
at  the  Savoy,  a  year  ago !  I  thought  then  that  you 
were  worth  while,  but  of  course  I  didn't  know  you 
were  to  burst  upon  us  like  this.  You  were  biding 
your  time,  weren't  you?  Such  a  deep,  designing 
person!" 

The  words,  in  cold  black  and  white,  have  the 
sound  of  rather  cheap  and  commonplace  flattery, 
the  ordinary  thing  that  women  say  to  rising  young 
men ;  but  Miss  Winter  had  a  way  quite  her  own  of 
saying  commonplace  things — a  half-mocking,  half- 
serious,  and  very  individual  way,  which  robbed  the 
words  of  their  commonness.  All  clever  women 
have  the  trick  of  seeming  to  take  an  intimate  per 
sonal  interest  in  any  man  whom  they  wish  to  at 
tract,  but  this  girl  had  something  more,  a  something 
indescribable,  which  must,  doubtless,  be  traced 
back  to  that  common  source  of  all  her  charm,  the 
equally  indescribable  quality  of  personal  magnetism 
in  her.  All  women  and  all  men  have  a  magnetic 
attraction,  in  part  physical  and  in  part  psychical, 

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which,  without  conscious  effort,  is  exerted  upon  a 
large  or  small  group  of  those  who  are  their  natural 
complements;  but  certain  women  exert  this  at 
traction  upon  so  large  a  number  of  people  that  it 
may  be  said  to  affect  almost  everybody.  And  there 
is  an  interesting  point  for  the  psychologists  who 
deal  with  such  matters. 

Beatrix  Faring  led  the  way  out  to  dinner  with 
old  Mr.  Cowper,  and  the  others  followed,  after  that 
absurd  two-and-two  fashion  which  seems  to  have 
obtained  since  the  animals  filed  into  the  historic 
ark. 

For  the  first  few  moments  after  they  were  seated, 
David  found  himself  engaged  by  the  nice  elderly 
lady  who  sat  at  his  left,  who  asked  him  if  he  did 
not  find  that  life  on  the  stage  had  the  effect  of 
deteriorating  his  moral  standard.  It  developed 
that  she  had  misunderstood  his  name  and  imagined 
him  to  be  a  certain  English  actor  who  by  some  odd 
chance  slightly  resembled  him.  It  took  David 
some  time  to  extricate  himself  from  this  and  to 
calm  the  elderly  lady,  who  was  stricken  with  horror 
over  the  frightful  insult  which  she  imagined  herself 
to  have  inflicted  upon  him;  so  that  when,  at  last, 
rather  hot  and  exhausted,  he  turned  to  Miss  Winter, 
that  young  woman  had  completed  her  first  polite 
assault-at-arms  with  the  man  at  her  other  side 
and  was  listening  with  undisguised  glee  to  David's 
struggles.  She  laughed  outright  as  their  eyes  met, 
and  said: 

"Never  mind!  In  a  few  years,  if  you  keep  up 
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your  present  pace,  no  one  will  mistake  you  for  any 
body  else.  They'll  all  have  photographs  of  you  at 
home,  and  they'll  send  them  to  you  to  autograph— 
neglecting  to  enclose  return  postage."  She  half 
closed  her  eyes,  looking  at  him  for  a  moment  quiz 
zically.  "There's  something  I  should  very  much 
like  to  ask  you,"  she  said, "  but  I  hardly  know  wheth 
er  or  not  I  dare  do  it.  It's  rather  cheeky,  I  'm  afraid. ' ' 

"Oh,  I  should  ask  it  if  I  were  you,"  said  David, 
"cheeky  or  not.  I'm  such  an  uncommonly  mild 
sort  of  person!  I  wouldn't  hurt  a  fly." 

"I  wonder —  '  said  she,  and  gave  a  short  laugh, 
looking  up  at  him  with  her  narrowed  eyes.  "  Well, 
it's  this,"  said  she.  "  I  want  to  know  if  you  really 
believe  in  it  all — in  the  things  you  write  about,  I 
mean ;  in  the  goodness  of  people  and  the  endurance 
of  love  and — and,  oh,  well,  all  the  nice,  fresh,  un 
spoiled  things  that  you  pretend  are  in  existence. 
I  want  to  know  if  you  honestly  believe  in  them  or 
if  you  write  about  them  with  a  grin,  knowing  that 
people  like  to  read  them  and  to  pretend  that  they 
think  they're  true.  Which  is  it?" 

"Oh,  that's  not  a  cheeky  thing  to  ask,"  said 
David.  "  I  don't  at  all  mind  answering  that.  Yes, 
I  believe  in  it  all.  If  I  didn't  I  expect  I  should  cut 
my  throat."  He  spoke  in  a  half -bantering  tone, 
but  his  eyes  widened  a  little  and  he  ceased  speaking 
when  he  saw  that  the  girl's  face  had  quite  altered 
and  turned  very  grave,  until  there  was  a  sort  of 
appeal  in  it,  an  almost  piteous  wistfulness  of  which 
he  would  not  have  believed  her  capable. 

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"Truly?"  she  said,  tinder  her  breath.  "Truly — 
honestly?" 

"Oh  yes,"  said  David,  in  another  tone,  "very 
honestly." 

"  I  wonder — "  she  said,  turning  her  eyes  away  from 
him.  And  she  sat  silent  for  a  little  while,  frowning 
down  at  the  table  before  her.  The  man  at  her  other 
side  spoke  to  her,  but  she  did  not  answer,  and  he 
glanced  up  at  David  and  turned  away  again. 

"I  wonder  if  it's  true,"  she  said,  presently,  and 
looked  up  once  more  with  an  odd,  half-angry  frown, 
as  if  David  had  offended  her. 

"I  think  so,"  said  he.  "I  think  most  people 
think  so,  only  they  like  to  pretend  that  they  don't. 
Cynicism  is  a  popular  pose;  but  I  should  think  it 
must  be  very  dull — if  it's  consistently  carried  out, 
that  is." 

"Oh,  it's  not  a  pose!"  she  said,  quickly,  and 
shook  her  head.  "  It's  not  a  pose  with  some  peo 
ple — with  most  people,  I  believe.  The — evidence 
is  really  on  their  side,  you  know — on  the  side  of  the 
cynics.  The — what  is  the  word? — preponderance 
of  evidence  is  on  their  side,  isn't  it?" 

"It  may  sometimes  have  that  look,"  said  David, 
stubbornly,  "but  I  think  that's  due  to  the  con 
spiracy  of  pretence  that  so  many  people  are  in. 
People  think  it's  young  and  rather  absurd  to  believe 
in  things.  But  I  think  the  things  exist  for  all  that. 
If  they  didn't,  the  world  wouldn't  go  round." 

She  nodded  her  head  at  him  slowly,  and  that 
mask  of  nervous  fatigue  and  discontent  and  cyni- 

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cism  which  she  habitually  bore — if  mask  it  was — was 
still  off,  and  a  strange,  grave  pathos  of  appeal  and 
wistfulness  was  in  its  place.  The  change  was  not 
altogether  becoming,  for  she  looked  older  and  oddly 
worn — almost  haggard,  as  people  usually  do  in  mo 
ments  of  emotion. 

"I  think  I'm  glad,"  she  said,  and  then  gave  a 
sudden,  amused  laugh,  springing  back,  as  it  were, 
for  a  single  swift  instant  into  her  normal  self, 
saying: 

"How  astonishingly  solemn  for  a  dinner-party! 
Well,  I  don't  care.  I'm  glad.  I  think  I  hoped  that 
you  were  honest  about  it,  but  I  was  very  much 
afraid  that  you  were  only  clever.  And  you  think 
that  such  things  really,  truly  exist,  and — that  or 
dinary  people  may  feel  them  ?  I  wonder — I  think 
I've  never  believed  in  it — in  that  sort  of  thing," 
she  said.  "It  wasn't  included  in  my  education. 
I  suppose  it's  a  rather  tragically  brutal  thing  to  do, 
to  drag  a  young  girl  about  the  Continent  from 
Madrid  to  Rome  and  from  Rome  to  Petersburg 
and  from  Petersburg  to  Vienna  and  Paris,  and  to 
let  her  meet  the  sort  of  people  whom  the  diplomatic 
set  meets  in  such  places.  That's  what  they  did  to 
me,  you  know.  I  went  from  the  Sacre  Cceur 
straight  into  that  when  I  was  eighteen  years  old, 
and  I've  been  in  it  ever  since — six  years!  So  you 
wonder  I  look  thirty?  Oh,  don't  try  to  be  civil! 
I  do.  I  know  it."  She  looked  at  David  with  a 
sort  of  bitter  defiance.  "I  think,"  she  said — "I 
think  I  have  never  before  met  any  one — any  man, 

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at  least,  and  scarcely  any  woman — who  believed,  or 
would  admit  that  he  believed,  in  unselfishness  and 
honest  devotion  and  enduring  love.  You're  rather 
an  event  to  me,  Mr.  David  Rivers." 

David  shook  a  scowling  head  at  her. 

"You'll  be  believing  in  all  those  things  yourself, 
one  day,"  he  said.  "You're  only  pretending,  like 
most  of  the  others,  now." 

"No,"  said  she,  "I'm  quite  honest  about  it,  as 
honest  on  my  side  as  you  are  on  yours.  It's  just 
possible  that  I  might  be  convinced,  but  I  don't 
know.  I  dare  say  I'm  safer  in  my  agnosticism. 
I'm  less  liable  to  disappointment." 

Then  David's  elderly  lady  claimed  him  again, 
and  when,  after  more  apologies  and  explanations, 
he  turned  back  to  Miss  Winter  her  mood  of  serious 
ness  seemed  quite  to  have  gone  from  her,  and  she 
would  only  poke  fun  at  him  about  the  maidens  who 
wept  over  his  works. 


CHAPTER  IX 

IT  was  not  until  several  days  after  his  return 
from  New  York  that  old  Robert  came  upon 
Rosemary  Crewe,  for  she  also  had  been  out  of 
town  spending  a  week  in  Rochester.  Then  one 
morning  he  met  her  in  Main  Street.  He  was  rather 
in  dread  of  the  encounter  and  tried  to  pass  her  by, 
but  Rosemary's  eyes  halted  him  against  his  will. 
He  could  not  deny  their  appeal. 

"Yes,  my  dear,"  he  said,  as  if  she  had  asked  him 
the  question  direct,  and,  indeed,  her  eyes  had  asked 
it.  "  Yes,  I  have  been  in  New  York — to  see  David. ' ' 

The  girl's  hands  went  swiftly  to  her  heart  and 
pressed  upon  each  other  there.  Old  Robert  looked 
away. 

"Will  you  tell  me  how  he  is,  sir?"  she  said,  after 
a  moment,  and  she  spoke  very  low. 

"  He  is  well — I  think,  well,"  said  old  Robert.  He 
looked  back  at  her  and  at  a  magazine  which  she 
held  clasped  under  her  arm.  The  cover  of  the 
magazine  was  of  a  peculiar  tint  and  design. 

"You  have  been  reading  his  last  story,"  said 
old  Robert. 

"Ah,  yes!"  she  said.  "Yes,  of  course!"  And 
the  man  smiled. 

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"He  is  changed,  my  dear,"  said  old  Robert. 
"David  is  changed  from  the  lad  you  and  I  knew. 
He  is  grown  older.  He's  no  longer  a  boy — in  spite 
of  the  things  he  writes." 

"  He  writes  beautiful  things!"  cried  the  girl,  with 
a  sort  of  sweet  fierceness.  She  hugged  the  maga 
zine  closer  against  her  side.  "No  one  else  writes 
such  things,  or  ever  wrote  them,"  she  said.  "He 
has  a  beautiful  soul.  You  must  know  that."  And 
old  Robert  smiled  again,  a  gentle  smile. 

"Does  he — does  David  speak  often  of — Croy- 
don?"  the  girl  asked,  after  a  little  pause. 

Robert's  eyes  dropped  away  from  hers  and  his 
smile  died  from  him. 

"He  is  very  ambitious,  my  dear,"  said  he. 
"  David  is  very  ambitious.  He  has  high  plans,  and 
they  occupy  him." 

She  said  "Oh!"  to  that,  under  her  breath,  and 
old  Robert  poked  with  his  stick  at  the  moss  in  the 
cracks  of  the  flag-stones.  And  presently  she  said, 
"  I'm  glad,"  still  in  a  sort  of  whisper.  "  I  want  him 
to  go  high  and  far,"  she  said.  "And  he  will  do  it. 
He  was  born  for  success.  When  does  he  come  back 
to  Croydon?" 

Old  Robert  looked  up  at  her  sharply. 

"You  don't  hear  from  him?"  he  demanded. 

"No,"  she  said.  "We  have  not  written  to  each 
other  for  a  long  time." 

He  broke  out  at  that  with  a  quick  exclamation: 
' '  Good !  Good ! ' '  But  the  sweet  pain  in  Rosemary 's 
eyes  shamed  him.  "  I  ask  your  pardon,  my  dear!" 

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said  he.  "That  was  unkind.  You  will  make  al 
lowance  for  me.  I  am — very  anxious  that  the  lad 
should  remain  free." 

And  she  nodded  in  grave  comprehension,  saying : 
"I  know — I  know.  And  when  does  he  return  to 
Croydon?"  she  asked  again. 

Old  Robert  sighed. 

"David  is  very  ambitious,"  said  he.  "He  will 
not  return  this  summer.  He  is  going  away  to  write 
a  book." 

And  this  time  it  was  Rosemary's  eyes  that  dropped. 
She  did  not  speak,  but  drew  a  little,  shivering  breath, 
and  was  still.  After  a  moment  the  magazine  slipped 
from  under  her  arm  and  fell  to  the  ground,  flutter 
ing  its  leaves  as  it  went.  Old  Robert  stooped  and 
picked  it  up,  and  the  girl  took  it  into  a  lax  hand, 
saying,  very  low: 

"Oh,  thank  you!  I'm  sorry.  Thank  you!" 
She  started  to  say  something  else,  but  presently 
shook  her  head  and  turned  away  without  speaking. 

Robert  watched  her  across  the  street,  and  sighed, 
and  went  on  his  way.  At  the  gate  he  sighed  again. 
"I  wonder — "  he  said,  aloud.  And  again:  "I  won 
der —  Shall  a  man  lose  so  much  and  gain  in  the 
end?  Sweet,  brave  eyes!  A  sweet,  brave  heart! 
Eh!  Women  must  weep  if  men  must  work." 

But  at  the  door  of  his  house  he  squared  his 
shoulders  and  the  old  look  of  stubborn  determina 
tion  came  once  more  over  his  face. 

"  David  shall  not  be  entangled!"  he  said,  fiercely. 
"  I  want  him  to  get  on.  And  if  he  would  get  on  he 

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must  be  free!  Let  women  weep  if  they  must!  I 
want  David  to  be  free,  free!" 

Rosemary  trod  her  slow  way  homeward,  and  a 
mist  of  darkness  hung  about  her  steps. 

"Da vie 's  not  coming  home!"  she  said.  And  she 
said  it  over  and  over  to  herself  in  a  sort  of  refrain. 

In  a  dull  fashion  she  felt  surprise  that  the  thing 
could  hurt  her  so,  for  from  the  first  she  had  said 
that  he  was  lost  to  her.  It  must  have  been  that 
some  strong,  live  hope  had  dwelt  subconscious  in 
her  all  the  while,  existing  there  in  the  dark  against 
all  that  could  assail  it.  And  the  hope  cried  aloud 
and  rent  her  ere  it  died. 

"Davie's  not  coming  home!"  she  said. 

She  pushed  open  her  gate  and  went  in  among  the 
tall  shrubs,  lagging  in  her  walk.  From  the  vine- 
clad  porch  beyond  a  little  child,  a,  neighbor's  child, 
cried  out,  "Wosemewy!  Wosemewy!"  and  dashed 
to  meet  her,  catching  her  about  the  knees  in  an 
ecstasy  of  delight,  and  burrowing  its  tangled  head 
into  her  skirts.  Rosemary  caught  the  child  up  to 
her  with  a  kind  of  sob,  and  held  it  close,  hiding  her 
face  against  the  flushed  little  cheek. 

The  children  of  Croydon  would  have  deserted 
homes  and  kin  for  this  girl.  She  mothered  them 
one  and  all.  They  came  to  her  with  their  joys  and 
small  wonderings,  and  with  those  poignant  trage 
dies  which  are  so  much  keener  and  more  overwhelm 
ing  than  adult  griefs;  and  she  listened  to  them 
gravely,  never  in  ridicule,  as  sometimes  their 
mothers  listened  and  soothed  and  comforted  them, 

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Madonna-wise.    She  had  a  "  way,"  Croydon's  moth 
ers  used  to  say  to  one  another. 

"Oh,  dearest,  dearest!"  Rosemary  cried,  face 
hidden  and  quivering.  "Oh,  dearest,  still  I  have 
you!" 

The  child  patted  her  cheek.  "  Wosemewy  told!" 
it  remarked. 

"Cold?"  she  said.  "Am  I  cold,  baby?  Yes, 
maybe.  Rosemary's  got  a  headache."  She  set  the 
small  being  down  upon  its  feet.  "See,  dear!"  she 
said.  "Rosemary  wants  to  be  alone  for  a  little 
while.  She's  got  a  headache.  Will  you  be  good 
and  run  home  now?  This  afternoon  I'll  come  for 
you  and  we'll  play  'house,'  with  ever  and  ever  and 
ever  so  many  children,  and  you  shall  name  them 
all." 

"Many  as  twenty?"  the  small  being  stipulated, 
holding  anxiously  to  Rosemary's  skirts. 

Rosemary  laughed — not  a  very  gay  laugh.  There 
might  have  been  tears  in  it,  but  the  child  was 
absorbed  in  the  prospective  splendors  of  that  un 
precedented  family. 

"Thirty!"  said  Rosemary.  "A  hundred!"  She 
stooped  again  and  kissed  the  small,  ecstatic  face. 
Then  she  went  quickly  in-doors.  From  one  of  the 
big  lower  rooms  beyond  the  hall  she  heard  her 
father's  dry  cough.  He  had  been  far  from  well  of 
late,  and  the  little  mother  had  been  ailing  too.  It 
was  Rosemary's  sweet  task  to  nurse  and  scold  and 
protect  them  both.  They  and  Croydon's  little  peo 
ple  made  up  her  life  in  these  days. 

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She  went  on  up  the  stairs  to  her  own  chamber, 
and  she  locked  herself  in  and  sat  down  beside  a 
window  which  looked  out  over  the  garden,  bare 
yet  and  dismal  in  the  raw  March  weather.  She 
sat  there  quite  still  for  an  hour,  and  then  wrote  a 
letter  to  David.  After  an  hour  more  she  tore  this 
up.  It  showed  the  hurt  too  plainly.  She  wrote 
another,  a  much  briefer  one,  and,  after  further  hesi 
tation,  went  out  and  posted  it.  The  letter  that 
David  received  said: 

"Mv  DEAR  DAVID  [it  will  be  observed  that  she  de 
nied  herself  even  the  'Davie'],  —  I  have  just  met  old 
Mr.  Henley  in  the  street,  and  he  has  told  me  about  seeing 
you  in  New  York,  about  all  the  splendid  work  you  are 
doing,  and  about  the  book  you  are  going  away  to  write 
this  summer. 

"I'm  so  glad,  David!  I  cannot  tell  you  how  I  exult 
over  the  success  you're  making.  I  foretold  it,  didn't  I  ? 
Didn't  I  ?  I  said  to  you  once  that  you  were  born  to 
succeed. 

' '  Of  course  I  have  read  everything  that  has  appeared 
so  far.  I  look  forward  month  by  month  for  a  certain 
magazine  to  come  out,  for  I  know  that  there  will  be  some 
thing  of  yours  in  it,  and  I  know  how  beautiful  that  some 
thing  will  be,  and  how  different  it  will  be  from  what  any 
one  else  in  the  world  could  do.  You've  a  sweetness  that's 
quite  your  own,  you  know. 

"  I  am  sorry  to  hear  that  you  are  not  to  come  to  Croy- 
don  this  summer,  but,  of  course,  with  important  work  to 
do,  you  are  very  wise  not  to  come  where  we  should  all 
make  such  a  lion  of  you.  I  had  hoped  to  be  able  to  tell 
you  in  person  how  I  love  what  you  are  doing.  That  is,  in 
part,  David,  why  I  have  not  before  this  time  written  to 
congratulate  you.  I  knew  how  inadequate  written  words 

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would  prove  to  be.  When  will  you  come  back  to  us,  I 
wonder  ?  When  you're  very,  very  famous  and  very  much 
a  lion,  I  suppose;  when  you've  done  what  you  consider 
your  important  work  and  feel  that  you  have  a  right  to 
rest.  Oh,  me!  how  many  of  us  who  want  to  shake  your 
hand  and  cheer  you  will  be  dead  by  that  time — or,  worse 
still,  married  and  settled  down! 

"Alas!  this  grows  into  a  long  letter  which  I  had  meant 
for  such  a  brief  word  of  greeting.  All  I  meant  to  say  was, 
Bravo!  Bravo!  You're  doing  beautiful  things,  and  I  am 
glad.  Don't  forget  quite  that  I'm  glad — that  we  are  all 
glad  here  in  Croydon.  We  want  to  add  our  little  cheer 
to  the  chorus. 

"And  so,  good-bye!  Write  your  book  and  make  it  a 
fine  book — the  finest  in  the  world,  as  only  you  can  do. 
I  shall  pray  for  its  success. 

"And  God  keep  you,  David! 

"ROSEMARY  CREWE." 

This  letter  came  to  David  one  morning  as  he  sat 
buried  in  work.  It  was  the  only  one  in  that  post, 
and  he  stood  by  the  door  of  his  studio,  his  pen 
crosswise  in  his  mouth,  like  a  dog  with  a  bone, 
staring  for  a  long  time  at  the  envelope  with  that 
once  so  dear  and  familiar  script.  He  tore  the 
envelope  apart  and  read  the  letter  where  he  stood. 
When  at  its  end  he  turned  at  last  to  cross  the  room, 
he  was  in  an  odd  fit  of  shaking.  And  there  was  no 
more  work  for  David  that  day. 

It  was  as  if  that  little,  fragrant,  aromatic  breeze, 
which  was  always  bearing  down  Main  Street  under 
the  vault  of  the  maples,  suddenly  had  breathed 
through  the  three-pair-back  four  hundred  miles 
away.  It  was  as  if  Rosemary,  virginal,  still-eyed, 
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eternally  Greek,  suddenly  had  arisen  before  him 
and  called  his  name.  David  dropped  into  a  chair, 
hands  over  his  eyes,  and  that  pitiless  keen  memory 
of  his  marshalled  before  him  old  sights  and  sounds 
and  smells,  things  long  buried  and  hidden  away — 
sweet  things,  sweet  as  lavender,  poignant  as  sharp 
est  pain.  Their  potency  shook  him  sorely,  and 
amazed  him,  too,  that  he  could  be  so  stirred. 

That  night  he  read  the  letter  again,  and  over  and 
over  many  times.  In  the  end  he  decided  that 
Rosemary  was  going  to  be  married,  else  why  had 
she  written  at  all,  after  waiting  so  long?  "Or, 
worse  still,  married  and  settled  down,"  he  said. 
That  must  be  the  reason  for  the  letter.  Rosemary 
married  and  settled  down!  He  was  once  more 
amazed  at  the  pang  it  gave  him,  and  at  the  ensuing 
ache  as  of  the  loss  of  something  very  dear  and 
precious.  Had  she  not  long  ago  been  lost  to  him? 

David  had  been  for  four  months  working  day 
and  night,  without  rest,  almost  without  intermis 
sion  of  any  sort,  and  his  nerves  were  on  edge,  for 
he  was  not  accustomed  to  work.  This  letter  of 
Rosemary's  threw  him  into  a  state  which,  in  a 
more  excitable  being,  would  have  been  something 
like  hysteria.  For  two  days  he  dwelt  in  a  sort 
of  fury  of  idleness,  memory  haunted,  sunk  in  black 
depression.  Both  the  desire  and  the  power  for 
work  were  gone  from  him  utterly.  Once  he  packed 
a  bag  to  go  to  Croydon,  but  got  no  farther  with  it 
than  that. 

On  the  third  day,  desperate  and  a  little  fright- 
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ened,  he  took  himself  sharply  in  hand,  and,  like  a 
stern  master  with  an  unruly  child,  set  his  pen  once 
more  to  its  work,  not  heeding  that  the  work  was 
bad  and  must  be  later  on  destroyed.  So  he  con 
tended  with  the  devils  which  tortured  him,  and  in 
a  day  or  two  was  himself  again.  But  the  thing 
taught  him  something  of  himself,  and,  for  long 
thereafter,  that  David  who  was  ambitious,  the 
craftsman,  the  builder,  held  whip  and  rein  with  a 
hard  hand  and  a  quick  eye  over  the  David  whose 
heart  beat  as  men's  hearts  do — who  remembered. 

In  May  he  left  town.  He  had  not  seen  Violet 
Winter  again  after  the  night  of  the  Farings'  dinner 
party.  For  two  or  three  weeks  he  utterly  forgot 
her,  and  then,  when,  a  little  ashamed,  he  tried  to 
look  her  up,  he  found  that  she  was  in  Wash 
ington. 

He  went  to  a  little  place  on  the  north  Maine 
coast,  to  a  house  in  the  femote  outskirts  of  a  tiny 
village,  where  a  friend  of  his  who  was  a  painter  had 
spent  the  preceding  summer.  There  the  good  peo 
ple,  old  fisher -folk  retired  from  the  sea,  living  in 
quiet,  with  their  bit  of  garden,  made  him  comforta 
ble;  and  there,  with  the  sea  and  the  keen,  clean 
wind,  and  the  beautiful,  driving  clouds  for  company, 
David  dwelt  apart  from  the  world,  and  the  Great 
Book  (truth  to  tell,  the  world  never  could  be  per 
suaded  that  it  was  great  or  even  very  important) 
had  its  birth  and  grew  to  its  stature  and  was  made 
complete. 

He  was  between  three  and  four  months  at  the 
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task,  and  they  were  very  happy  months,  though 
they  contained  no  amusement  at  all  as  the  common 
meaning  of  the  term  goes — happier  months  than 
any  others  David  knew  for  a  very  long  time  after 
this. 

Indeed,  it  is  doubtful  if  in  this  world  there  exists 
a  keener,  purer,  loftier  joy  than  the  joy  of  the  eager 
workman  set  apart  from  the  world,  alone  with  his 
work;  for  he  attains  as  nearly  as  mortal  may  to 
the  eternal  state  of  the  good  workman  who  has  gone 
beyond,  where — 

"No  one  shall  work  for  money,  and  no  one  shall  work 
for  fame; 

But  each  for  the  joy  of  his  working,  and  each  in  his  sepa 
rate  star, 

Shall  draw  the  Thing  as  he  sees  It,  for  the  God  of  Things 
as  They  Are!" 

Probably  it  is  because -the  thing  came  into  be 
ing  under  such  conditions  of  quiet  and  peace  and 
supreme  delight  that  David  ever  after  regarded 
this  first  book  of  his  with  a  fond  and  partial  eye. 
Even  now,  when  he  has  done  a  half-dozen  books 
which  his  judgment  must  tell  him  are  infinitely 
superior,  you  have  but  to  speak  slightingly  of  his 
first-born  to  rouse  David  to  battle.  He  will  hear 
no  ill  of  it. 

So,  by  the  sea,  under  kindly  skies,  he  wrought 
lovingly  and  with  pains,  and  towards  the  end  of 
August  the  thing  was  done.  Then  he  took  a 
month  of  complete  idleness,  of  lying  in  the  sun,  of 

1 08 


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fishing  and  swimming,  by  way  of  vacation,  and 
with  the  close  of  September  returned  to  New  York 
and  the  studio  in  East  Seventeenth  Street,  where 
he  had  renewed  the  lease  for  another  year,  bearing 
his  great  treasure  with  him. 


CHAPTER  X 

EARLY  in  November  Miss  Violet  Winter  re 
turned  to  New  York.  She  had  spent  the 
summer  abroad.  She  wrote  to  David,  saying  that 
she  was  once  more  settled  in  Sixty-seventh  Street, 
and  would  be  glad  to  see  him  there;  but,  before 
he  found  time  to  call,  he  met  her  quite  accidentally 
one  day  in  the  street. 

He  had  taken  some  small  perplexity  connected 
with  his  work  out  into  the  open,  one  afternoon, 
in  the  hope  that  the  fresh,  keen  air  would  solve  it 
for  him.  He  walked  far  up  Fifth  Avenue,  past 
Fifty-ninth  Street,  and  thence  alongside  the  Park, 
and  had  come  wellnigh  to  the  Metropolitan  Museum 
when  he  became  aware,  bearing  down  upon  him,  of 
Violet  Winter,  towed  at  a  rate  somewhat  beyond 
her  normal  speed  by  a  large  and  energetic  Great 
Dane. 

Between  them  they  managed  to  check  the  dog's 
career  long  enough  to  greet  each  other,  and  pres 
ently  David  turned  back  with  the  girl  and  walked 
down  the  avenue  beside  her.  He  was  genuinely 
glad  to  see. her,  for  she  had  from  the  first  interested 
him  as  a  type,  and,  upon  the  occasion  of  the  Far- 
ings'  dinner-party  of  the  spring  previous,  had  really 

no 


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appealed  to  his  sympathy  as  a  creature  who  had 
lost  somehow  out  of  her  life  very  much  of  that 
sweetness  and  peace  to  which  every  life  has  an 
inherent  right. 

It  seemed  to  him  that  she  was  looking  nervous 
and  tired  and  ill,  much  worse  than  in  the  spring — 
as  if  she  had  got  no  rest  or  recuperation  out  of  her 
summer — and,  not  very  tactfully,  he  told  her  so. 

She  looked  at  him  with  a  little,  frowning  laugh. 

"What  a  dreadful  thing  to  say  to  anybody!"  she 
complained.  "You  imply  that  I  look  a  fright. 
Well,  I  do.  I  know  it.  No,  I'm  not  so  very  well. 
I  never  have  been,  you  know.  Why,  in  Heaven's 
name,  I  don't  die  and  have  done  with  it  is  beyond 
my  comprehension.  I  seldom  have  anything  in 
particular  the  matter  with  me — anything  disabling, 
I  mean.  It's  just  these  wretched  nerves,  and — that 
sort  of  thing." 

She  gave  a  quick,  almost  vicious  jerk  at  the  leash 
of  the  Great  Dane,  which  was  pulling  too  hard  for 
her,  and  a  sudden  odd  paroxysm  of  pain  went  over 
her  face. 

"Oh,  I  hate  it!"  she  cried,  in  a  low,  fierce  voice. 
"I  hate  it!  No  one  ever  hated  to  be  weak  and 
under-vitalized  and  nerve-racked  so  bitterly  as  I 
do!  You  know,  there's  something  quite,  quite 
wrong  somewhere.  Why  can't  people's  souls  fit 
their  bodies?  Our  eyes  are  mates,  and  our  arms 
and  our  feet.  Why  should  one  sort  of  mind  and 
soul  be  so  stupidly  put  into  another  different  sort 
of  body  and  be  left  there  to  rebel  and  suffer?  I 

in 


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want  to  be  healthy  and  red-cheeked  and  strong, 
like  other  people!  I  want  it  more  passionately 
than  you  ever  wanted  anything  in  your  life,  I 
think.  I  want  to  live  my  life,  not  drag  a  miser 
able,  thin-blooded  existence  through  it  as  I  do. 
I  have  a  right  to  live.  Every  one  has.  It's  a 
right  we  ought  to  be  born  with.  We  might  at  least 
be  given  that  much.  Do  you  know?"  She  turned 
her  head  to  look  into  David's  face.  "  Do  you 
know?"  she  said — "I  wonder  if  you'll  laugh.  I 
think  not.  I  want  so  desperately,  so  passionately 
to  be  well  and  strong,  to  feel  the  beautiful,  thrilling 
insolence  of  pure  joie  de  vivre,  that  I  dream  about 
it  sometimes.  That's  how  I  know  what  it  is  like. 
I  dream  that  I'm  as  strong  and  wholesome  and  un 
tiring  as  one  of  those  apple-cheeked  peasant-girls 
you  see  working  all  day  in  the  vineyards,  and  going 
home  at  night  almost  as  fresh  as  she  came.  I 
dream  I'm  like  that,  and  I — oh,  I  exult  in  it  so! 
Then  I  wake  in  the  morning  with  a  headache,  and 
it  tires  me  to  lift  an  arm." 

She  stopped  suddenly,  and  broke  into  a  laugh  of 
genuine  amusement. 

" Oh,  my  poor  dear  man!"  she  cried.  "  What  am 
I  doing  to  you  ?  I  wonder  you  haven't  remembered 
an  engagement  and  fled  from  me.  I'm  exactly  like 
one  of  those  dreadful  old  women  you  meet  in  Ham 
burg  or  Wiesbaden,  who  pin  you  into  a  corner  and 
describe  their  woes,  am  I  not?  Truly,  I'm  sorry. 
Forgive  me,  and  I  won't  do  it  any  more!  We  turn 
here!  You're  coming  home  with  me  to  have  a  cup 

112 


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of  tea.  It's  the  least  I  can  do  by  way  of  making 
amends." 

David  frowned  at  her  thoughtfully. 

"Never  mind  about  that!"  he  said.  "Yes, 
thanks,  I'll  go  in  for  a  few  minutes,  if  I  may!  I'm 
glad  you  spoke.  I  wonder  —  you  aren't  happy 
enough;  that's  the  trouble,  you  know.  You'd  be 
well  enough  if  you  were  happy — not  a  blowsy  peas 
ant-girl,  of  course,  but  well  enough  to  get  on. 
You're  making  a  wreck  of  yourself  by  being  un 
happy.  What  are  you  unhappy  about?" 

She  looked  at  him  with  that  sudden,  sharp  wist- 
fulness  which  he  had  seen  in  her  once  before. 

"  Life!"  she  said.  "  I  seem  to  have  missed  every 
thing.  I  expect  you're  right  in  what  you  say.  I'm 
unwell  because  I'm  unhappy,  and  I'm  unhappy  be 
cause  I  seem  to  have  missed  all  the  real  things 
and  the  real  people.  Here  we  are!  I  wonder  if 
my  aunt  is  in!  I  should  like  you  to  meet  her. 
She's  a  rather  odd  woman,  I  should  think.  She's 
exactly  what  I  shall  be  in  twenty-five  years  more, 
if  I  live  that  long,  which  I  probably  sha'n't.  We're 
really  very  fond  of  each  other  in  a  grim  sort  of 
fashion.  It's  a  matter  of  understanding." 

She  gave  the  Great  Dane  into  the  care  of  the  man 
who  let  them  in,  and  then  led  David  up  to  the 
drawing-room.  The  tea  was  just  being  brought, 
but  it  appeared  that  Mrs.  Hawtrey,  the  aunt,  was 
not  in  the  house;  she  was  expected  shortly. 

"And  now,"  said  Miss  Winter,  as  she  installed 
herself  behind  the  tea-table,  "we  have  finished  with 

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my  troubles.  I  refuse  to  moan  any  more  to-day. 
Let's  go  on  to  yourself.  Beatrix  Faring  says  you 
spent  last  summer  in  some  remote  wilderness  writ 
ing  a  novel.  I  was  very  glad  to  hear  that.  Is  it  a 
good  novel? — and  when  is  it  to  appear?" 

"  I  think  it's  a  good  novel,"  said  David,  laughing 
a  little,  "though  my  confidence  has  been  somewhat 
jarred  of  late.  When  I  wrote  it  I  thought  it  was 
more  than  good.  I  don't  know.  Probably  it  isn't 
at  all." 

"Don't  tell  lies!"  said  Miss  Winter,  burning  her 
hand  in  the  steam  from  the  kettle.  "  If  you  weren't 
perfectly  sure  that  it  is  good  you'd  tear  it  up.  Oh, 
what  must  one's  feelings  be  over  one's  very  first 
book!  The  mother's  over  her  first  child,  I  suppose. 
You  people  who  create  things  have  such  a  world  of 
your  own  to  retreat  to  when  this  world  hurts  you! 
You  ought  to  be  very  grateful  and  very  happy, 
even  if  the  critics  or  the  public  ignore  you — which 
they  haven't  done  in  your  case,  have  they?  you 
absurdly  successful  person;  you  still  have  your 
inner  world  to  hide  in.  Pity  us  poor  outsiders, 
who  haven't  such  a  refuge!  When  did  you  say  the 
book  was  to  come  out?" 

David  told  her  that  the  publication  was  to  be  in 
January;  and  from  that  they  went  on  to  talk  of 
what  he  was  doing  meanwhile,  and  what  his  plans 
for  the  future  were,  David  in  an  agony  of  discomfort, 
for  he  unaffectedly  hated  to  talk  about  his  work. 
And  they  had  a  sort  of  mock  quarrel  over  a  certain 
tale  of  his  which  had  appeared  during  the  late  sum- 

114 


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mer — one  of  the  two  accepted  by  old  Mr.  Cowper — 
of  which  Miss  Winter  violently  disapproved. 

Then  presently  Mrs.  Hawtrey  came  in — she  had 
been  at  a  musical  matinee — and  David  was  pre 
sented  to  her.  He  was  surprised  and  interested 
to  find  how  very  true  Miss  Winter's  remark  about 
the  resemblance  between  the  two  women  had  been. 
It  was  quite  plain  that  if  the  younger  woman 
should  go  on  as  she  was  going,  if  some  complete 
bouleversement  did  not  come  to  her  to  shock  her 
out  of  her  course,  she  was  certain  to  be  at  fifty 
what  her  aunt  was  at  that  age.  The  elder  woman 
seemed  to  have  all  the  younger's  peculiar  traits 
and  qualities  intensified,  and,  as  it  were,  frozen  by 
longer  habit.  The  resemblance  was  strong  even 
in  things  physical,  though  Miss  Winter  was  dark 
and  her  aunt  fair. 

Mrs.  Hawtrey  was  very  civil  to  David,  saying 
that  her  niece  had  so  often  spoken  of  him  to  her, 
and  that  several  other  people  had  also.  And  she 
said  something  vaguely  polite  about  what  she 
termed  his  celebrity.  She  had  that  ready  and 
effortless  power  of  putting  people  quite  at  their 
ease  which  is  characteristic  of  the  women  of  her 
world,  but  it  was  evident  that  she  did  not  attempt 
to  force  herself  to  any  personal  interest  in  the 
matter,  acting,  as  it  were,  automatically,  like  an 
excellent  machine  which  does  not  fail  to  do  the 
utmost  that  could  be  required  of  it,  the  require 
ment  obviously  not  extending  to  self -gratification. 

Then,  while  she  drank  her  tea,  she  commented 


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upon  several  of  the  people  who  had  been  at  the 
musical  matinee,  and  her  comments  were  not  kind. 
True,  she  did  not  push  them  to  the  limits  of  extreme 
bad  taste,  and  she  said  nothing  libellous;  but 
David,  without  difficulty,  gathered  the  impression 
that  Mrs.  Hawtrey's  eyes  were  opened  more  keenly 
to  observe  the  world's  shortcomings  than  to  delight 
in  its  virtues.  She  had  a  sharp  and  acidulous 
tongue,  and  the  fact  that  it  was  also  a  very  clever 
tongue  scarcely  removed  its  sting.  David  took 
note  that  she  never  smiled.  There  was  sometimes 
a  slight,  nervous  contortion  of  the  thin  lips,  but  it 
was  nearer  a  sneer  than  a  smile. 

Altogether  she  made  him  a  little  uncomfortable, 
not  so  much  as  regards  herself — he  was  indifferent 
there — but  in  the  almost  uncannily  prophetic  pict 
ure  she  presented  of  the  Violet  Winter  of  five-and- 
twenty  years  hence.  And  so,  after  a  few  minutes, 
he  got  away.  Mrs.  Hawtrey,  as  he  was  going, 
asked  him  if  he  would  dine  with  them  one  day  in 
the  following  week,  and,  no  reasonable  excuse  pre 
senting  itself  upon  the  spur  of  the  moment,  David 
said  he  would. 

As  a  matter  of  fact,  he  really  welcomed  the  op 
portunity  of  again  seeing  Miss  Winter,  but  the 
elder  woman  had  moved  him  to  a  rather  absurdly 
intense  dislike.  He  felt  that  she  was  antipathetic 
to  almost  everything  in  his  nature,  and  common 
decency  made  him  shrink  somewhat  from  sitting 
at  her  table  the  while  he  cherished  towards  her  such 
uncomplimentary  sentiments. 

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After  he  had  gone,  the  two  women  remained 
together  in  the  drawing-room,  for  it  was  not  yet 
time  to  dress  for  dinner.  Miss  Winter  moved 
across  to  one  of  the  windows  and  stood  there  idly, 
staring  out  into  the  quiet  street.  Her  head  ached 
slightly,  and  she  leaned  her  brow  against  the  cold 
glass  for  the  chill  relief  it  offered. 

"Mr.  Rivers  will  get  wet,"  she  said,  after  a 
time.  "  It's  beginning  to  rain.  What  a  beastly 
day!" 

"November  is  a  beastly  month,  to  borrow  your 
rather  vulgar  word,"  said  the  elder  woman,  from 
the  table  where  she  was  making  herself  a  second 
cup  of  tea.  She  broke  a  biscuit,  which  was  stale 
and  crumbled  in  her  fingers,  and  she  dropped  the 
bits  with  a  little  exclamation  of  annoyance. 

"So  that  is  your  young  writer-man!"  she  said. 
"Horton  really  must  be  more  careful  about  these 
biscuits;  they're  abominable!  I  hope  I  did  right 
to  ask  him  for  dinner  next  week?" 

"Oh  yes,  thanks!"  said  the  girl,  not  turning. 
"Yes,  I  like  him.  He's  very  young,  and  so  few 
people  are  that,  nowadays !  And  he  has  nice,  young, 
wholesome  beliefs  about  things.  I  don't  mean  that 
he  is  religious.  I  should  think  he  isn't  that.  He's 
too  natural.  But  he's  young  and  strong  and  rather 
different  to  other  people,  and  he's  on  the  way  to 
being  very  successful.  There's  something  like  great 
ness  in  him  somewhere.  One  day  it  may  come 
out.  I  don't  know." 

She  struck  her  fingers  sharply  against  the  glass 
117 


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of  the  window,  as  if  a  sudden  nervous  spasm  had 
shaken  her. 

"  Oh,  I'm  tired !"  she  said.  "  I'm  ghastly  tired  of 
everything  in  the  world.  No  one  was  ever  so  tired 
as  I  am.  I  wish  that  nice  boy  would  take  me  by 
the  hand  and  lead  me  away  to  that  Garden  of  Eden 
he  writes  so  much  about,  and  shut  me  into  it." 

The  elder  woman  brought  her  tea  across  to  the 
window,  and  she  peered  at  her  niece  with  a  sort  of 
amused  curiosity  which  had  not  a  hint  of  tender 
ness  in  it. 

"Shut  you  in  with  himself  or  alone?"  she  in 
quired. 

Miss  Winter  gave  a  little  dry  laugh. 

"  You're  hard  as  nails,  Aunt  Laura !"  she  observed. 

"I  wish  you  would  refrain  from  using  these 
vulgar  expressions  when  I  am  near,"  said  the  elder 
woman,  without  passion.  "They  annoy  me  very 
much.  And  if  I  am  hard,  so  will  you  be  at  my 
age." 

"Oh,  I  shall  be  dead  long  before  that,"  the  girl 
said,  "but  I'm  hard  enough  now." 

"And  as  for  Gardens  of  Eden,"  pursued  Mrs. 
Hawtrey,  "they  do  not  exist.  It  can  be  geograph 
ically  proved,  my  dear,  that  no  other  world  exists, 
this  side  the  grave — no  other  accessible  one,  at 
least,  than  the  one  we  know.  I  don't  say  it  is  a 
particularly  joyous  world,  but  it's  all  we  have.  I 
read  one  of  your  young  man's  stories  in  a  magazine 
a  few  months  ago.  If  they  are  what  you  refer  to,  I 
must  say  that  they  seem  to  me  exceedingly  silly.'* 

118 


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"They  would!  They  would!"  said  the  girl,  with 
conviction.  "  You  do  not  surprise  me."  She  turn 
ed  again  to  stare  frowning  out  into  the  deserted 
street,  where  a  fine,  cold  rain  had  begun  to  fall. 

"For  myself,"  she  continued,  "I  am  not  quite 
certain  about  them.  Either  they  are  very,  very 
silly  (for  grown-up  reading),  or  else  they  are  very 
wise — much  wiser  than  you  or  I  know.  What  if 
they  are  that?" 

The  elder  woman  made  a  little  exclamation  ex 
pressive  of  scorn. 

"What  if  they're  that?"  the  girl  went  on.  "It 
may  be,  you  know.  If  I  could  believe  in  the  things 
he  believes  in!  If  I  could  lay  off  all  the  bitter 
things  that  I  think  I  know  about  the  world,  as  one 
lays  off  a  cloak!  If — " 

"Are  you  falling  in  love  with  this  young  man?" 
asked  Mrs.  Hawtrey,  abruptly.  • 

"No!"  said  the  girl,  shaking  her  head.  She 
turned  to  face  the  elder  woman  and  looked  at  her 
gravely.  "No,  I'm  not,"  she  said  again.  "I 
haven't  been  in  love  with  anybody  since  I  was 
seventeen,  I  think.  But  I — cling  to  this  boy — 
somehow.  I  don't  know  just  why.  Yes,  I  do! 
He  has  all  the  things  that  I  haven't,  that  I  want — 
health,  real  youth,  honest  beliefs  in  honest  things, 
enthusiasms  that  the  wretched  facts  of  life  can't 
kill.  What  if  he  could  teach  me  all  those?" 

"If  you  are  not  in  love  with  him  now,"  said 
her  aunt,  "you  are  well  on  the  way,  I  should 
think." 

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An  odd,  bleak  look  came  upon  Miss  Winter's  face. 
She  faced  Mrs.  Hawtrey  defiantly. 

"Well,  what  if  I  am?"  she  demanded. 

"Fancy  what  would  come  of  it!"  said  that  lady, 
pulling  out  a  tiny  watch  from  her  girdle. 

"  What  ?"  said  the  girl.     "  What  ?" 

The  elder  woman  yawned  slightly  behind  her 
hand. 

"  Oh,  shipwreck,  for  both  of  you,  doubtless,"  said 
she.  "  It's  time  to  dress  for  dinner.  Are  you  com 
ing  ?  I  must  remember  to  tell  Horton  about  those 
stale  biscuits." 


CHAPTER   XI 

THE  Great  Book  came  into  the  world  covertly, 
and,  as  it  were,  in  shame.  No  fanfare  of 
glad  trumpets  heralded  its  nativity,  no  campaign 
of  flamboyant  advertising  accompanied  and  upheld 
its  early,  tottering  steps.  One  or  two  tiny  and 
shrinking  notices  had  appeared  in  those  daily  papers 
which  are  read  by  snuffy  old  gentlemen  in  the  more 
ancient  of  clubs,  stating  that  Messrs.  Gray  &  Go's, 
spring  list  of  fiction  would  open  unusually  early 
with  a  novel  by  Mr.  David  Rivers,  a  new  writer, 
entitled  The  Walls  of  Destiny.  The  novel  was, 
with  admirable  brevity,  described  as  "a  romance 
in  modern  dress. "  Beyond  these  few  retiring  words 
of  announcement  the  book  was  left  to  its  own  un 
aided  powers — to  sink  or  swim.  It  may  be  stated 
here  that,  at  least  so  far  as  was  concerned  the  pub 
lic  at  large,  it  sank.  No  other  course  seemed  open 
to  it. 

David  dwelt  in  a  cloud  of  despair  through  which 
at  intervals  darted  lightning  flashes  of  rage.  He 
was  far  from  being  one  of  those  temperamental 
people  who  are  over-easily  wafted  to  heights  or 
plunged  into  depths,  but  he  had,  as  the  phrase  goes, 
set  his  heart  upon  this  book.  He  had  written  his 

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heart  into  it,  and,  so  far  as  he  could  judge  in  the 
first  weeks  after  publication,  he  might  as  well  have 
burned  the  manuscript,  unread. 

True,  certain  friends  in  whose  critical  judgment 
he  had  confidence,  and  for  whose  good-will  he  cared 
much,  declared  stoutly  for  his  cause,  maintaining 
that  he  had  done  a  fine  piece  of  work,  and  had 
proved  to  all  the  world  (David  grinned  there)  that 
he  could  do  more  than  write  short  stories.  But 
with  all  that  he  could  add  to  the  credit  side  of  his 
ledger — and  that  was  not  much — he  was  forced  to 
confess  that  the  work  in  which  his  soul  had  found 
the  keenest  delight  of  its  existence,  the  work  upon 
which  he  had  builded  such  confident  hopes,  was  an 
entire  failure.  And  that  failure,  like  all  first  fail 
ures,  which  to  young,  proud  eyes  loom  so  over 
whelming,  dealt  him  a  hurt  from  which  he  was 
very  long  in  recovering,  thrust  him  down  from  a 
height  which  he  never  again  quite  attained. 

Old  Robert  Henley's  delight  over  the  thing  was 
one  of  the  few  sweet  drops  in  his  bitter  cup  at  this 
time.  He  had  sent  the  old  gentleman  the  first  of 
his  complimentary  copies — indeed,  the  work  was 
dedicated  to  him,  a  rather  graceful  inspiration  of 
David's  —  and  Robert,  with  this  copy  under  his 
arm,  the  pages  carefully  bent  down  so  that  the  book 
would,  of  its  own  accord,  open  to  the  dedication 
page,  spent  his  days  walking  about  the  streets  of 
Croydon  where  people  were  thickest,  cordially 
greeting  folk  with  whom  he  had  not  exchanged  a 
word  for  ten  years,  and  proudly,  before  man,  woman, 


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and  child,  exhibiting  the  book  of  David  Rivers. 
"  At  last  Croydon  has  produced  a  genius,  sir!  Yes, 
by  gad,  sir,  a  genius!" 

Rosemary  had  her  copy  too.  Like  old  Robert 
Henley  she  carried  it  under  her  arm,  pressed  against 
her  heart,  but  she  did  not  exhibit  it  to  Croydon. 
She  hid  it  from  the  world,  for  it  was  her  very 
own — David's  book — all  that  was  left  to  her  of 
Davie. 

He  had  done  a  cruel  thing  there,  for  on  the  fly 
leaf  of  Rosemary's  copy  he  had  written  above  his 
name:  "Rosemary.  That's  for  remembrance!" 
He  had  not  meant  to  be  cruel.  The  phrase  had 
sprung  to  his  pen  as  he  wrote  her  name.  Rosemary 
was  for  remembrance  to  him  now — a  very  sweet 
remembrance.  He  had  long  since  ceased  even  to 
wonder  about  that  indefinable  something  which  had 
come  slowly  between  them  and  cloaked  them,  each 
from  the  other.  And,  besides,  was  she  not  to  be 
married  ? 

He  had  asked  old  Robert  Henley  about  that  in 
one  of  his  letters.  Was  it  true  that  Rosemary 
Crewe  was  engaged  to  somebody  ?  Robert  did  not 
answer,  but  David  asked  again ;  and,  finally,  the  old 
man — fiercely  alert  as  always  at  the  faintest  hint  of 
danger  to  the  lad — replied  very  guardedly,  saying 
nothing  definite  but  allowing  David  to  infer  that  he 
had  his  suspicions.  It  must  have  hurt  him  to  do 
that,  for  he  was  ever  the  soul  of  truth  and  honor; 
but  David's  success,  and  the  freedom  from  encum 
brance  which  he  believed  to  be  necessary  to  that 

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success,  had  become  a  sort  of  obsession  to  the  old 
gentleman.  He  would  have  cleared  David's  path 
with  fire  and  sword,  considering  the  cost  of  no 
moment  whatever. 

Another  of  those  early  copies  of  The  Walls  of 
Destiny  had  gone  to  Miss  Violet  Winter,  whom 
David  saw  rather  often  nowadays.  She  read  it 
overnight,  and  in  the  morning  sent  a  message  to 
David  asking  him  to  call  that  day  in  Sixty-seventh 
Street  if  he  could  manage  it. 

"I  expect  I  have  Dragged  you  from  work,"  she 
said,  when  he  came,  "and  all  for  my  own  selfish 
satisfaction.  Well,  no,  not  quite  all.  I  suppose 
you're  glad  when  anybody,  even  the  humblest  of 
us,  likes  the  things  you  do?  Well,  you've  done  a 
very  fine  thing  in  this  book,  and  I  couldn't  wait  to 
tell  you  so  until  such  a  time  as  chance  might  bring 
us  together."  It  might  be  said  that  chance,  or 
something  else,  was  of  late  bringing  them  together 
rather  often ;  but  David  passed  that  over. 

She  leaned  forward  towards  him  over  the  tea 
things  on  the  table  before  her,  and  her  face  was 
quite  earnest  and  serious. 

"I'm  not  being  polite,"  she  said.  "We  two  have 
got  a  bit  beyond  that,  I  hope — beyond  the  point  of 
being  formally  civil  with  each  other,  I  mean.  I 
truly  believe  that  this  is  a  fine  thing  and  a  big 
thing.  You've  done  well,  my  friend.  You're  go 
ing  to  go  far  and  high,  aren't  you?  A  great  love," 
she  continued,  thoughtfully,  as  if  summing  the 
thing  up — "a  great  love  struggling  with  a  sense  of 

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honor  which  most  men  would  laugh  at  and  call 
quixotic!  A  man's  soul  and  a  woman's  soul  stirred 
and  shaken  to  their  very  nethermost  depths  be 
cause  honor  stood  in  their  way.  You  know,  most 
of  the  people  I  have  known  never  bothered  very 
much  about  honor.  Of  course  they  didn't  cheat  at 
cards,  and  they  paid  their  bridge  debts  before  they 
paid  their  tailors,  and  they  more  or  less  protected 
their  own  women ;  but  the  finer  points — the  kind 
of  honor  your  man  and  woman  in  The  Walls  of 
Destiny  suffered  over — well,  I  think  they  usually 
stepped  round  those  to  avoid  falling  over  them. 
Do  you  really  believe  that  there  are  such  people 
as  these  people  of  yours — great,  clean,  uplifted  souls 
who  put  honor  before  everything?" 

"  I  know  there  are,"  said  David.  "  I  know  some 
of  them." 

"Oh,  of  course,"  she  said,  "there's  the  great 
middle  class.  That's  profoundly  honorable  the 
world  over.  But  it's  profoundly  dull,  too,  and  I 
must  have  picturesqueness  in  my  honorable  people. 
We're  all  such  wretched  shams!"  she  cried.  "The 
points  of  honor  that  we  hold  to  are  such  conven 
tions!  They  don't  come  from  the  soul  at  all.  One 
class  doesn't  in  the  least  mind  appropriating  its 
neighbor's  wife,  so  long  as  the  matter  is  kept  reason 
ably  from  publicity,  but  holds  that  it  must  pay  its 
gambling  debts  before  all  others,  that  it  mustn't 
cheat  at  cards,  and  that  if  it  is  called  certain  names 
it  must  attempt  to  kill  the  person  who  did  the  call 
ing.  Another  social  class  knows  nothing  of  these 

125 


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fine  distinctions,  but  has  quite  another  set  of  shams. 
It's  sickening!  And  yet,"  she  said,  slowly,  "I'm 
beginning  to  be  convinced — you're  beginning  to 
convince  me  that,  after  all,  there  are  people  in  this 
world  to  whom  life  and  love  and  honor  (true  honor, 
of  the  soul)  mean  quite  another  thing.  I  shall 
make  you  shy  and  embarrassed,  as  you  always  are 
when  people  talk  to  you  about  yourself,  but  the 
strongest  reason  I  have  for  believing  in  the  people 
you  write  of,  the  people  you  believe  in,  is  that  you're 
that  sort  yourself.  If  you  should  be  put  into  the 
situation  of  the  man  in  your  book  you'd  do  exactly 
as  he  did.  I  know  that,  and  so,  after  all,  it  seems 
to  be  the  preacher  rather  than  the  sermon  that's 
saving  my  poor  little  soul."  She  seemed  quite  sud 
denly  to  realize  that  she  was  entering  upon  rather 
dangerous  ground,  for  a  quick  flush  came  up  over 
her  white  cheeks  and  she  hurried  on  in  another, 
lighter  tone  —  the  half -mocking  tone  which  was 
habitual  with  her. 

"How  do  you  like  being  forced  into  the  role  of 
missionary  to  the  heathen?"  she  asked.  "You 
may  complain  if  it  hurts  your  feelings.  I  sha'n't 
blame  you." 

David  twisted  unhappily  in  his  chair. 

' '  Well ,  I  don '  t  know,  "he  said .  ' '  You — you  seem 
to  be  making  me  out  rather  a — prig,  don't  you? 
I've  merely  been  arguing  that  there  are  heaps  of 
decent  people  in  the  world  who — who  run  straight, 
you  know,  and  all  that.  Now  you  seem  to  be 
making  it  appear  that  I  pose  for  one  of  them  my- 

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self — a  sort  of — pedestal  hunter.  I  never  said  I 
was  one  of  them,  did  I  ?" 

Miss  Winter  laughed  again  gleefully. 

"No,  you  didn't!"  said  she.  "That  was  rather 
despicable  of  me,  that  trying  to  force  you  into  your 
own  picture.  Men  do  so  hate  to  admit  that  they're 
not  shocking  bad  lots!  It's  only  the  real  villains 
who  want  to  appear  good.  But  I  never  called 
you  good.  Please  note  that!  I  only  said  you  had 
the  same  notion  of  honor  and  fair  play  that  you 
write  about.  That's  not  such  a  frightful  charge, 
after  all.  I  wonder  why  it  is,"  she  added,  reflect 
ively,  "that  men  like  to  have  women  believe  them 
bad  lots?" 

"  I  expect  it's  because  they  know  that  most 
women  secretly  admire  bad  lots,"  submitted  David. 

"Yes,"  she  said,  nodding  at  him.  "I  expect 
that's  it.  And  still  that's  only  the  very,  very  good 
and  astonishingly  inexperienced  woman — the  stay- 
at-home  little  girl.  She  shivers  with  delight  over  a 
villain  because  she  doesn't  really  know  what  a 
villain  is.  It's  the  dark  mystery  of  the  thing. 
Women  adore  mysteries." 

"I  take  it,  then,"  said  David,  "that  you,  not 
being  a  stay-at-home  little  girl,  yourself  prefer  men 
who  are  good?" 

"No,  I  don't,"  said  she.  "Good  men  are  dull. 
I  should  shock  a  truly  good  man  terribly.  I  expect 
he'd  pray  for  me,  and  I  couldn't  bear  that.  No,  I 
don't  like  prigs,  but  I  don't  like  the  opposite  thing, 
either.  I've  seen  too  many  of  that  sort."  She 

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looked  across  at  David  with  a  sort  of  grin — if  it  can 
be  said  that  ladies  grin.  "I  like  your  sort,"  she 
said,  and  David  laughed,  for  he  liked  her  sort,  too. 
He  liked  her  best  when  she  was  least  serious,  when 
a  mood  of  camaraderie  came  upon  her  and  she  un 
mercifully  chaffed  him,  as  one  man  to  another  (so 
she  would  have  put  it). 

Mrs.  Hawtrey,  in  her  worst  humor  towards  the 
world  and  its  peoples,  came  into  the  room  just  then, 
and,  as  soon  as  he  could,  David  went  away.  The 
elder  lady  depressed  him  beyond  words.  He  never 
overcame  his  first  dislike  for  her,  and  her  appear 
ance  was  always  the  signal  for  his  departure. 
Violet  Winter  had  more  than  once  chidden  him 
amusedly  over  it,  maintaining  that  he  was  down 
right  rude,  but  David,  though  his  manners  other 
wise  were  impeccable,  on  this  point  remained  stub 
born.  He  could  not  be  kept  for  more  than  ten 
minutes  in  the  room  with  Miss  Winter's  aunt  save 
on  the  rare  occasions  when  he  dined  there,  and  at 
these  times  Miss  Winter,  to  save  him  pain,  man 
aged  that  the  two  hostile  forces  should  be  separated 
by  the  length  of  the  table. 


CHAPTER   XII 

BUT  if  in  this  first  month  or  two  after  the 
launching  of  The  Walls  of  Destiny  David 
dwelt  in  depths  of  bitter  gloom,  circumstances 
which  arose  shortly  thereafter  restored  him  to  at 
least  a  moderate  cheer — chastened,  and  perhaps  a 
little  wiser — and  turned  his  thoughts  into  a  new 
and  unexpected  channel. 

In  the  first  place,  the  newspaper  reviews — David 
had  subscribed  to  one  of  those  "bureaus"  which 
dog  the  steps  of  the  young  author — had  been  com 
ing  in,  two  or  three  each  day,  and  while  by  no 
means  all  were  enthusiastic  or  even  approving, 
still  they  were  in  the  average  very  favorable. 
They  deplored  the  fact  that  Mr.  Rivers  should 
have  chosen  to  devote  his  really  fine  talents  to  a 
theme  already  so  threadbare;  they  said  that  this 
type  of  pseudo-romance  was  deservedly  dead,  but 
that  since  Mr.  Rivers  had  felt  called  upon  to 
resurrect  its  bones  it  must  be  confessed  that  he 
had  performed  his  ghoulish  task  admirably. 

Then  the  London  publishing  house  which  had 
taken  over  the  British  rights  decided  to  use  the 
story  as  a  serial  in  their  magazine,  which  was  a 
very  popular  one.  They  had  it  illustrated  by  a 

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famous  man,  and,  since  the  story  of  romantic 
adventure  was,  just  then,  more  popular  in  Eng 
land  than  in  America,  it  attracted  a  generous 
amount  of  attention,  and  David's  name  became 
known  not  unfavorably  to  another  public. 

But  the  real  beginning  of  his  return  to  the  joys 
of  life  was  due  to  the  agency  of  John  Cowper.  It 
seems  that  this  kindly  old  gentleman,  upon  read 
ing  The  Walls  of  Destiny,  was  struck  with  the 
dramatic  qualities  which  the  tale  possessed.  He 
was  convinced  that  in  skilful  hands  it  might  be 
turned  into  an  excellent  play ;  and  so,  without  con 
sulting  David,  prevailed  upon  a  certain  very  suc 
cessful  and  influential  manager,  who  was  a  friend 
of  his,  to  read  it  with  that  in  view.  The  outcome 
of  the  matter  was  that  David  received  an  offer  for 
the  American  dramatic  rights  to  his  novel,  the 
arrangement  to  be  upon  a  royalty  basis,  as  is  usual 
in  such  cases,  with  a  prepayment  of  five  hundred 
dollars  in  advance  of  royalties.  The  manager  ex 
plained  that  he  hoped  to  persuade  a  well-known 
dramatist,  who  was  skilled  in  just  this  sort  of  work, 
to  undertake  the  adaptation. 

To  David  it  was  like  a  flash  of  sun  at  midnight — 
like  that  first  unlooked-for  beginning  of  success 
when  the  Gayety  had  accepted  his  three  short 
stories,  though  more  amazing  still,  for  that,  after 
all,  was  a  thing  hoped  for,  and  this  totally  without 
warning  or  preparation.  It  had  never  occurred  to 
him  that  the  book  might  be  suited  to  stage  use, 
and,  oddly  enough,  for  the  story  was  really  dra- 


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matic,  no  one  had  ever  suggested  to  him  such  a 
possibility. 

Then  scarcely  had  he  made  a  beginning  upon 
the  work  he  had  in  hand — short  stories  for  certain 
magazines  which  had  asked  him  for  contributions — 
when  he  had  a  long  cablegram  from  London,  signed 
by  a  very  famous  actor-manager,  and  sent  through 
David's  London  publishers,  in  whose  magazines  The 
Walls  of  Destiny  was  running  its  serial  course. 
The  actor-manager  asked  for  a  brief  option  on  the 
British  dramatic  rights  to  the  story,  and  requested 
a  reply  by  cable.  He  stated  that  he  was  writing 
more  fully  on  the  matter.  David  cabled,  granting 
the  option,  and  when  the  letter  arrived  found  that 
the  actor,  whose  name  was  Harrington,  had  been 
struck  by  the  first  few  chapters  of  the  novel  as  they 
appeared  in  the  magazine,  had  asked  for  and  ob 
tained  a  set  of  proofs  of  the  entire  story,  and  was 
full  of  enthusiasm  over  the  dramatic  possibilities 
of  the  thing.  He  had,  in  preparation  for  the  open 
ing  of  his  season  on  May  ist,  a  weak-kneed  play  in 
which  he  felt  small  confidence,  and  he  wished  to 
have  a  dramatic  version  of  David's  book  hurriedly 
made  and  substituted  for  the  other  play.  He 
stated  that  the  dramatist,  a  veteran  known  both 
in  England  and  America,  had  read  the  proofs  of 
the  story  and  waited  only  for  David's  word  to 
begin  his  labors.  Mr.  Harrington  also  suggested 
that  if  David  could  find  it  convenient  to  come  to 
London  in  April  he  would  be  of  great  assistance 
to  them  all  in  the  production. 


A    STUMBLING-BLOCK 

David  at  once  cabled  "Go  ahead!"  and  wrote  to 
say  that  he  would  spend  the  month  of  April  in 
London  and  see  the  play  launched.  The  American 
production  was  not  to  be  made  until  the  following 
winter. 

So  it  seemed  that  fate,  in  denying  to  the  lad  his 
heart's  dearest  wish — the  success  of  his  beautiful 
book — had  been,  after  all,  only  playing,  for  her  own 
inscrutable  reasons,  a  sort  of  gentle  trick  upon  him, 
as  a  mother  withholds  a  sweet  from  a  child  until  its 
little  lips  begin  to  quiver  with  grief,  and  then,  to 
repay  it,  gives  it  two  in  place  of  one. 

He  wrote  to  Robert  Henley,  telling  him  of  the 
two  arrangements  into  which  he  had  entered ;  that 
he  was  to  go  to  London  for  the  month  of  April,  and 
would  probably  remain  abroad  through  the  sum 
mer,  as  he  had  a  plan  for  a  new  book.  Old  Robert 
replied  in  high  delight,  saying  that  he  would  give 
half  his  remaining  years  to  be  present  at  the  open 
ing  night  in  London,  but  that  he  would  have  to 
wait  for  the  New  York  production.  "And  now," 
he  went  on,  "  a  brief  word  regarding  your  income. 
You  have  been  making  a  very  respectable  sum  out 
of  your  magazine  stories  of  late,  but  even  with  that 
and  the  paltry  thousand  that  goes  to  you  yearly 
through  my  hands,  you  cannot  have  very  much 
laid  up  for  the  coming  summer.  Now  I  won't  have 
you  pinched  for  money.  It  has  hampered  many  a 
good  worker,  just  as,  no  doubt,  it  has  stimulated 
others.  You  don't  need  stimulus.  You  need  a 
free  and  unconcerned  mind.  So  I  am  forwarding 

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you  a  New  York  draft  for  two  thousand.  That  will 
tide  you  over  the  summer,  I  suppose.  If  not,  send 
for  more.  It's  your  own,  and  you  have  a  right  to 
it  when  you  need  it  most.  I  only  advise  nowadays. 
I  don't  want  to  exert  any  authority  which  may  rest 
in  me.  Of  course  I  have  the  handling  of  your  funds 
until  you  are  thirty,  but  I  want  you  to  use  them, 
within  reason,  as  freely  as  you  see  fit.  Some  of  the 
investments  have  turned  out  so  unexpectedly  well 
within  the  past  few  years  that  you  can  be  fairly 
liberal  with  yourself  without  touching  your  princi 
pal." 

David  saw  Miss  Violet  Winter  rather  often  dur 
ing  this  time.  He  had,  during  the  past  few  months, 
fallen  into  the  habit  of  dropping  in  at  the  house  in 
Sixty-seventh  Street  two  or  three  times  a  week, 
which  was  much  oftener  than  he  called  anywhere 
else.  He  would  have  found  it  very  difficult  to  say 
in  just  what  fashion  he  cared  for  Miss  Winter, 
though  he  certainly  would  have  denied,  and  with 
perfect  truth,  that  he  was  in  love  with  her.  He 
had  long  since  got  beyond  his  earliest  feeling — an 
interest  in  her  as  an  example  of  a  certain  type.  He 
liked  her  for  very  many  reasons:  because  she  was 
clever,  almost  brilliant;  because  of  her  extraor 
dinary  variations  of  mood;  because  almost  always 
she  understood  him  without  need  of  words;  but, 
doubtless,  most  of  all  because  she  had  offered  him, 
and  in  all  honesty,  that  subtlest  of  flatteries,  the 
beginning  of  surrender  of  an  habitual  prejudice  and 
belief  to  his  belief,  the  beginning  of  the  laying  off 


A    STUMBLING-BLOCK      . 

of  her  armor  of  bitter  cynicism  to  put  on  the  mantle 
of  his  idealistic  charity.  She  had  let  him  think — 
and  again  in  all  honesty  —  that  he  was  remaking 
her  entire  nature,  remodelling  her  upon  a  better, 
sweeter  plan,  and,  while  this  idea  would  have  sent 
David  into  a  panic  of  shyness  and  embarrassment 
had  it  been  broadly  put  to  him  in  such  plain  words 
— would  have  evoked  from  him  prompt  and  scan 
dalized  denials — still,  the  spirit  of  it,  faint  and  very 
alluring,  stirred  like  wine  in  his  veins,  and  bound 
him  to  this  girl  with  chains  whose  strength  he  did 
not  realize. 

How  much  Violet  Winter  realized  of  whither  the 
two  were  tending  it  is  impossible  to  say.  Like 
David,  she  drifted  where  the  tide  bore,  but  it  is 
certain  that,  unlike  him,  she  allowed  herself  to 
drift,  as  it  were,  with  a  certain  deliberation.  It 
was  as  if  she  felt  the  seas  where  she  lay  unbearable, 
unendurable,  and  so,  eyes  closed,  hands  tightly 
clinched,  let  herself  be  borne  away,  convinced  that 
the  change  must  be  for  the  better,  since  there  could 
be  no  worse. 

But  whatever  may  have  been  her  feelings  about 
this,  she  certainly  showed  a  strong  desire  to  have 
David  near  her  as  much  as  was  possible  and  to  have 
him  meet  her  friends.  She  often  said  to  him  that 
she  was  very  tired  of  the  life  she  had  been  leading. 
She  complained  that  it  was  a  foolish  life  which 
meant  nothing,  and  led  to  nothing  but  a  rather 
unwholesome  love  of  mild  excitement — "the  chase 
of  the  new  sensation,"  she  called  it.  But  David 


A    STUMBLING-BLOCK 

could  not  help  observing  that  she  seemed  in  no 
way  eager  to  quit  this  existence,  and  that  she  even 
tried  her  best  to  draw  him  into  it.  He  spoke  of  it 
to  her  once,  and  she  laughed. 

"  I  suppose  habits  are  as  strong  as  the  reformer 
people  say  they  are,"  she  admitted.  "I  suppose 
this  sort  of  thing  is  in  my  blood,  so  to  speak.  And, 
after  all,  what  else  is  there  for  me  to  do  ?  I'm  much 
too  nervous  to  sit  about  cfoing  nothing,  and  I'm 
not  physically  strong  enough  to  make  a  business 
of  golf,  or  anything  like  that,  as  some  women  do. 
I  like  to  have  people  about  me,  the  people  I  know 
and  care  for — a  little;  even  sometimes  the  people 
I  don't  care  for.  They  almost  all  have  something 
to  say.  Those  who  aren't  in  what  is  called  '  society ' 
have  a  curious  idea  that  those  who  are  in  are 
utterly  brainless  and  silly  and  vapid.  I  wonder 
why,  because,  of  course,  it  isn't  in  the  least  true. 
The  most  interesting  men  and  women  I  have  ever 
known  have  been  those  whose  occupation  is  having 
a  good  time.  They  have  to  be  clever,  just  as  they 
have  to  be,  nowadays,  rich,  or  they'll  be  trodden 
under.  And  I  suppose,"  she  continued,  "that  that 
is  why  I  like  to  have  you  meet  my  friends  and  know 
them.  It  seems  to  me  that  they're  really  the  peo 
ple  most  worth  knowing,  because  they're  the  pleas- 
antest  to  get  on  with  and  the  most  entertaining  to 
talk  to." 

This  was  not  altogether  consistent  with  Miss 
Winter's  frequent  expressions  of  disgust  over  the 
aimless  life  she  was  leading,  but  David  did  not 


A    STUMBLING-BLOCK 

remark  upon  it,  because  she  was  often  inconsistent, 
and  because  he  vaguely  realized  that  she  was,  in 
these  days,  in  an  odd  state  of  transition — inertia 
battling  with  discontent,  and  an  intense  longing  for 
change.  But  he  met,  at  one  time  or  another,  many 
of  the  people  that  Miss  Winter  saw  oftenest,  and 
liked  some  of  them  on  their  own  account  and  not 
just  because  they  were  her  friends.  And,  seemingly, 
they  liked  him  also,  for  they  asked  him  to  their 
houses  and  treated  him  not  as  an  outsider  but  as  if 
he  might  have  been  one  of  themselves  who  was 
given  to  mild  eccentricity  in  the  way  of  writing 
things  for  publication. 

He  found  them  to  be,  with  certain  exceptions, 
very  much  as  Miss  Winter  said,  the  pleasantest 
people  of  his  acquaintance  to  get  on  with.  They 
were  comfortably  assured  of  most  of  the  things  of 
this  world  which  they  desired,  and  so  they  had  no 
disappointed  ambitions  and  no  important  griev 
ances  of  which  to  complain.  There  were  certainly 
many  petty  and  amusing  jealousies  among  them, 
and  much  scandalous  gossip;  but  David  had,  up 
to  this  time,  failed  to  discover  any  social  circle  of 
any  degree  wherein  these  things  were  not  to  be 
found,  and  it  seemed  to  him  that  they  were  rather 
more  harmless  in  this  particular  circle  than  in  the 
others,  because  they  were  less  serious.  Even  that 
cynicism  against  which  he  had  so  often  fought  in 
Violet  Winter,  and  which  was  so  prevalent  among 
her  friends,  seemed  to  him  to  be  in  most  cases  a 
light-hearted  and  laughing  cynicism  with  no  bitter- 

136 


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ness  in  it.  Miss  Winter  had  added  a  bitterness  of 
her  own  that  was  purely  personal. 

But  with  all  this,  as  time  wore  on  he  found  him 
self  chafing  against  this  pleasant  new  world,  im 
patient  with  it  for  its  very  ease  and  pleasantness. 
After  all,  he  was  of  another  caste,  and  belonged 
elsewhere.  There  are  sound  reasons  why  artistic 
and  professional  people  naturally  herd  together, 
quite  beyond  the  obvious  reason  that  for  the  most 
part  they  have  neither  sufficient  wealth  nor  leisure 
to  associate  on  equal  terms  with  the  "idle  rich." 
The  creative  mind  naturally  respects  and  likes  its 
fellow,  and  the  two  feel  that  they  are  on  common 
ground  and  speak  the  same  language.  The  men 
who  are  engaged  in  creating  the  world's  books  or 
pictures  or  music  often  wish  that  they  had  nothing 
to  do  but  play  with  motor-cars  and  yachts,  and 
otherwise  spend  their  time  in  the  chase  of  amuse 
ment;  but  when,  now  and  then,  one  such  finds 
himself  by  some  miracle  transferred  to  the  motor 
ing,  yachting  world,  he  is  thoroughly  miserable,  be 
cause  there  is  that  within  him  which  will  neither  be 
prostituted  nor  stilled.  He  is  not  his  own  master. 

And  so  David  and  Violet  Winter  were  not  always 
in  accord  over  the  disposition  of  David's  spare  time, 
and  they  had  a  number  of  amusing  and  half -serious 
little  quarrels  on  the  subject. 

"I  like  your  friends,"  he  would  say.  "I  like 
them,  or  some  of  them,  very  much,  but — they  don't 
mean  anything.  I  prefer  the  people  who're  doing 
things  that  count.  They're  often  not  so  pleasant, 

i37 


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I  grant  you;  there's  much  more  envy  and  hatred 
and  malice,  in  a  serious  way,  among  them,  but — 
well,  hang  it,  they're  doing  the  things  that  make 
the  world  worth  living  in,  don't  you  see!  They 
seem  to  be  more  worth  while  because  their  lives 
mean  more." 

To  this  Miss  Winter  would  reply  as  her  mood 
chanced  to  dictate,  sometimes  acquiescing,  some 
times  in  impatient  argument.  But  once  she  said 
something  which  seems  to  have  been  very  signifi 
cant  of  her  attitude  at  this  time.  David  had  been 
holding  forth  rather  hotly  upon  the  fact  that  he  did 
not  belong  in  the  pleasant  and  gentle  and  unpro 
ductive  world  which  she  frequented,  and  she  an 
swered  slowly,  as  if  picking  her  words  (she  had  a 
habit  of  seeming  to  think  aloud  with  David) : 

"  No,  no,  in  many  ways  you  don't,  of  course.  I 
understand  that.  We  must  all  seem  very  purpose 
less  and  rather  useless  to  you,  I  know.  You're 
doing  important  things,  and  you're  going  to  do 
things  more  important  still,  and  we  do  nothing 
that  is  of  any  importance  at  all  except  to  ourselves. 
No,  I  should  not  like  to  think  that  you  were  going 
to  spend  your  life  among  the  people  I've  lived 
among.  They'd  be  a  bad  influence  for  you. 
They'd  smother  you  in  time,  I  think.  But —  Do 
you  know,"  she  said,  "I  rather  think  I've  been 
dragging  you  into  all  this  from  purely  selfish 
motives.  I  rather  think  I've  been  watching  the 
effect  of  these  people  upon  you  and  the  effect  of 
you  upon  them." 

138 


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David  laughed  and  stared. 

"It  is  rather  contemptible  of  me,  isn't  it?"  she 
said,  "but  I  think  that  is  what  I've  been  doing. 
You  see,  one  doesn't  come  to — important  decisions 
without  weighing  all  the  available  evidence.  I've 
been  for  a  long  time  wishing  that  I  could  believe 
the  things  you  believe.  I  think  that  if  I  could  do 
that  I  should  be  very  much  happier,  but  I'm  such 
a  wretched  sceptic !  I  wanted  to  bring  you  together 
with  the  people  who  have  been  in  part  responsible 
for  what  I've  always  believed,  and  see  if  you'd  hold 
your  own  there  against  them.  I  thought  possibly 
you'd — hypnotized  me."  She  gave  a  little  laugh 
that  was  not  all  mirth. 

"  Do  you  resent  it  ?"  she  asked.  "  Do  you  think 
it  was  quite  too  bad  of  me?  You  see,  I  want  so 
very  keenly  to  be  convinced." 

David  grinned  cheerfully  at  her,  for  he  did  not 
believe  that  she  was  serious. 

"  Oh  no,  I  don't  resent  it,"  said  he.  "  I  think  it's 
rather  comic,  though.  It  sounds  as  if  I  had  been 
unconsciously  holding  a  sort  of  public  debate  with 
your  friends.  If  I'd  known  I  should  have  had 
stage-fright  badly." 

Miss  Winter  smiled  in  answer  to  him ;  but  again, 
if  he  had  watched  her  more  closely,  there  was  some 
thing  other  than  mirth  in  her  smile. 

"I'm  not  sure,"  she  said,  "that  'public  debate' 
doesn't  express  it  rather  well.  I  Ve  always  prodded 
you  on  to  argument  at  the  slightest  excuse,  always 
set  you  up  on  your  hobby  when  there  was  the 


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smallest  chance,  and  I've  been  as  exultant  over 
each  point  that  you  made  as  if  you'd  been  arguing 
before  a  jury  for  my  life.  And,  in  a  fanciful  way, 
so  you  were.  You  see,"  she  added,  "you're  so  very 
important  to  me!"  But  she  said  it  with  sufficient 
lightness  to  rob  the  words  of  any  very  serious 
interpretation,  and  once  more  David  laughed ;  but 
deep  within  himself  he  was  touched  and  pleased,  be 
cause  it  was  so  evident  that  in  spite  of  the  lightness 
with  which  she  chose  to  cloak  her  words,  Miss  Win 
ter  really  leaned  upon  him,  and  looked  to  him  for 
help  and  hope.  It  is  the  most  winning  and  intoxi 
cating  form  of  flattery  that  any  woman  can  offer 
to  any  man,  and  it  is  a  proverbial  truth  that  the 
best  of  men  are  far  from  invulnerable  to  flattery. 
Certainly  young  David  Rivers  was  not  invulnerable 
to  it. 

He  went  to  London  in  the  last  week  of  March. 
He  had  managed  to  complete  two  or  three  short 
tales,  and  had  made  arrangements  with  a  certain 
publishing  house,  which  was  much  to  the  fore  just 
then,  for  a  novelette  which  had  appeared  serially 
in  a  magazine  and  had  attracted  a  good  deal  of 
favorable  attention,  to  be  brought  out  in  book  form 
early  in  September.  It  was  a  tale  very  different 
in  type  to  The  Walls  of  Destiny,  and  seemed  perhaps 
better  adapted  to  appeal  to  a  large  public. 


CHAPTER  XIII 

THE  London  season  formally  begins,  each  year, 
usually  on  the  evening  of  May  ist,  with  the 
opening  performance  of  opera  at  Covent  Garden. 
Royalty  is  there,  dignitaries  of  all  grades  abound, 
and  you  cannot  leave  your  seat  in  the  stalls,  be 
tween  acts,  without  treading  upon  at  least  one 
duchess  and  a  half-dozen  ladies  of  scarcely  less 
august  station  in  life.  So  the  brief  eight  or  ten 
week  period  of  gayety  is  entered  upon  with  proper 
pomp,  splendor,  and  sound ;  but,  since  only  a  por 
tion  of  the  fashionable  world  can  crowd  itself  into 
this  one  enclosure,  certain  of  the  great  actor-man 
agers,  who  take  pride  in  appealing  to  the  taste  of 
Mayfair,  reserve  their  most  promising  productions 
for  this  time  of  the  year,  and  open  their  theatres 
with  a  new  play  on  the  evening  of  May  ist. 

And  so,  on  that  date  of  the  year  with  which  we 
have  to  deal,  while  royalty  and  as  many  of  the 
great  elect  as  could  find  place  were  more  or  less 
listening  to  Puccini's  "Boheme"  at  Covent  Gar 
den,  a  large  portion  of  the  overflow  gathered  in  a 
certain  historic  theatre  to  see  Mr.  Charles  Har 
rington  and  his  company  enact  "The  Walls  of 
Destiny,"  a  play  in  four  acts,  adapted  by  an  emi- 

141 


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nent   gentleman   from    the  novel    by   Mr.   David 
Rivers. 

David,  rather  white  and  very  nervous — he  jump 
ed  if  spoken  to  suddenly — sat  in  a  box  with  the 
pretty  wife  of  the  actor-manager  and  two  or  three 
friends  of  hers.  He  saw,  in  different  parts  of  the 
house,  a  few  people  whom  he  knew — people  who 
had  entertained  him  on  his  previous  visits  to 
London,  and  who  had  come  to  see  his  play  out  of 
a  kindly  interest  in  him.  He  wished  irritably  that 
they  had  gone  somewhere  else,  for  at  the  final 
dress  rehearsal,  on  the  night  before,  it  had  seemed 
to  him  that  the  play  was  bad  beyond  description. 
He  could  not  believe  that  it  would  please  or  enter 
tain  anybody,  and  he  felt  an  angry  wonder  that  any 
one  so  tried  and  experienced  as  Mr.  Charles  Har-' 
rington  could  be  willing  to  go  on  with  it.  He  had 
decided  that  that  gentleman's  feelings  must  be 
sheer  desperation  —  the  desperation  of  one  who 
knows  that  his  fight  is  hopeless,  but  leaps  into  the 
combat  with  eyes  shut  and  arms  waving  because 
there  is  nothing  else  for  him  to  do. 

But  the  worst  of  it  all,  to  David,  was  that  he 
knew  Violet  Winter  was  to  be  present.  She  had 
come  to  London  a  day  or  two  before  this  to  remain 
for  the  early  part  of  the  season,  as  she  usually  did. 
He  looked  about  the  house  for  her,  but  could  not 
make  her  out,  until,  just  before  the  curtain  rose, 
some  people  came  into  the  box  next  to  the  one  in 
which  he  was  sitting  and  he  saw  that  Miss  Winter 
was  among  them.  He  went  round  to  greet  her  and 

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found  that  he  knew  all  her  party.  They  chaffed 
him  amusedly  upon  his  melancholic  air,  and  the 
men  tried  to  lure  him  out  into  the  bar  of  the 
theatre,  assuring  him  that  if  he  would  take  three 
large  drinks  he  wouldn't  care  whether  the  play  failed 
or  not.  But  David  shook  a  gloomy  head  at  them, 
and  refused  to  be  cheered  in  any  fashion. 

"If  you  want  my  advice,"  he  said,  "  I  advise  you 
to  go  somewhere  else ;  or  if  all  the  other  places  are 
closed,  go  home — anywhere  but  here.  I  tell  you, 
I've  seen  this  play  and  you  haven't.  It  bored  me 
and  I  know  it  '11  bore  you.  I  wish  you'd  go  away." 
But  they  said  they  would  suffer  to  the  end  rather 
than  desert  anybody  whom  they  liked  so  much, 
and,  as  the  curtain  rose  just  then,  David  went  back 
to  his  own  seat  and  braced  himself,  as  it  were,  for 
the  disaster  which  was  to  follow. 

There  was  no  disaster.  The  play  "went"  very 
well  indeed.  It  was  no  masterpiece,  but  it  was  a 
good  play  fashioned  by  an  experienced  and  skilled 
hand;  the  large  audience  before  which  it  was  be 
ing  enacted  followed  it  with  genuine  interest,  if 
with  no  mad  enthusiasm,  and  applauded  its  most 
telling  points  as  generously  as  any  one  could  have 
desired. 

David,  buried  under  his  pall  of  gloom,  did  not 
realize  that  the  lines  which  he  had  heard  repeated 
fifty  times  and  in  almost  fifty  different  fashions, 
came  new  and  fresh  to  the  people  about  him. 
When  the  beautiful  heroine  told  how  trodden  upon 
she  was,  and  impressionable  ladies  in  the  upper 


A    STUMBLING-BLOCK 

regions  of  the  house  sniffed  and  wiped  their  noses, 
David,  in  imagination,  heard  the  staccato  tones  of 
the  stage  director,  from  the  prompt  side,  saying, 
wearily : 

"No,  no!  Not  like  that!  Take  that  over  again! 
Not  like  that  at  all!"  And  when  the  villain,  after 
his  big  scene,  dropped  down  into  a  chair  and  sat 
with  his  finger-tips  together  and  a  sardonic  smile 
on  his  pale  face,  David,  remembering  how  they 
had  worked  over  the  "business"  of  that  scene,  was 
on  the  point  of  calling  out,  angrily : 

"No,  you  don't  do  that!  You  cross,  right,  after 
that  speech,  and  Mr.  Harrington  comes  down 
stage!"  He  was  filled  with  a  dull  wonder  that 
speeches  which  seemed  to  him  to  "read"  so  well 
should  be  so  pompous  and  so  banal  when  spoken 
from  the  stage,  and  he  could  not  understand  why 
all  those  well-dressed  and  seemingly  intelligent 
people  should  appear  to  enjoy  such  preposterous 
nonsense.  The  conviction  was  finally  brought 
home  to  him  that  it  was  all  a  very  grotesque  and 
farcical  game,  and  that  audience  as  well  as  actors 
were  all  gravely  pretending. 

From  that  he  fell  to  noting  the  points  in  the  play 
which  the  company  and  he  himself  had  expected 
to  "go"  best  of  all,  and  he  was  grimly  amused  to 
find  that  many  of  them  were  passed  over  quite 
unnoticed,  while  other  things,  upon  which  no 
reliance  at  all  had  been  placed,  were  greeted  with 
applause,  or  with  that  stir  of  quick  response  which 
passes,  wavelike,  half -audibly  through  an  audience 

144 


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and  is  dearer  to  the  actor's  soul  than  any  quantity 
of  uproar. 

The  first  act  closed  with  seemingly  the  best  of 
feelings  between  stage  and  house.  The  applause 
was  very  generous,  there  was  one  curtain-call— 
which  might  easily  have  been  forced  into  two  or 
three — and  the  hum  of  talk  which  uprose  imme 
diately  afterwards  had  the  sound  of  interest  and 
satisfaction  rather  than  of  critical  disapproval. 
Mrs.  Harrington  leaned  over  and  patted  David's 
arm. 

"Do  cheer  up,  my  dear  man!"  she  said,  laughing 
at  his  gloomy  face.  "It  is  really  going  very  well, 
indeed.  Very  w^ll." 

"Oh,  I  don't  know,"  said  David,  morosely. 
"  That  applause  sounded  to  me  rather  more  like 
politeness  than  enthusiasm." 

"Oh,  well,"  she  said,  "you  must  remember  that 
it's  not  the  sort  of  house  to  go  mad  over  any 
thing.  I  tell  you  the  play  is  a  success  already, 
and  I  ought  to  know.  If  they  will  take  the  first 
act  as  well  as  they  have,  they'll  take  the  rest  of  it, 
because  the  first  act  is  far  the  worst  of  the  four ;  it's 
too  talky.  I  wish  you'd  smile  just  once.  You 
make  me  nervous."  And  then  the  people  in  the 
next  box  leaned  over  the  dividing-rail  and  said  that 
it  was  not  half  bad,  not  bad  at  all,  and  the  men 
begged  David  to  come  and  have  one  of  those  three 
drinks  now.  So  he  went  and  had  it,  and  felt  much 
better,  and  during  the  next  act — which,  as  Mrs. 
Harrington  had  foretold,  was  received  with  an  in- 

J45 


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crease  of  enthusiasm — really  began  to  enjoy  him 
self  in  a  nervous,  half -miserable  way. 

In  the  third  act  the  play  became  distinctly  melo 
dramatic,  with  a  beautiful  fight  and  a  heroic  re 
nunciation;  and  at  its  end  not  even  the  most 
captious  could  have  complained  of  the  volume  and 
sincerity  of  the  applause.  There  were  a  half-dozen 
curtain  calls,  and  even  demands  for  a  speech. 

"Oh  yes,"  said  David,  grinning  happily  across 
at  Mrs.  Harrington,  "it's  going  to  go,  right  enough. 
I  surrender.  I  thought  it  was  bad,  but  it  isn't  bad 
at  all.  It's  jolly  good.  I'm  having  a  beautiful 
time." 

The  fourth  and  last  act,  as  is  customary  with  all 
proper  last  acts,  extricated  everybody  on  the  stage 
from  his  undeserved  troubles — except  the  villain, 
who  was  dead,  and  permanently  out  of  trouble — 
and  removed  from  the  ladies  and  gentlemen  on  the 
other  side  of  the  footlights  their  not  very  serious 
dread  of  a  "bad  ending."  There  followed  much 
clapping  of  hands  and  many  bravi  from  friends  of 
manager  or  playwright,  and  these  gentlemen  ap 
peared  before  the  curtain  in  turn  and  made  little 
speeches  saying  how  very  proud  and  happy  and 
grateful  they  were  at  having  scored  another  success 
with  a  public  whose  favor  was  very  dear  to  them. 
The  elderly  playwright,  a  merry  soul  with  white 
hair  and  a  florid  face,  politely  declined  to  accept 
more  than  a  small  part  of  the  credit  due  to  the 
authorship  of  the  piece,  saying  that  the  lion's  share 
should  be  ascribed  to  Mr.  Rivers,  whose  delightful 

146 


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book,  etc.,  etc.  He  looked  towards  the  box  where 
David  sat  in  the  shadow,  and  David  grinned  across 
at  him  and  nodded  cheerfully. 

A  few  persons  in  the  gallery,  jealous  of  their 
ancient  and  honored  rights,  insisted  upon  a  faint 
hearted  "boo,"  but  the  "boos"  was  obviously  in 
sincere  save  when  the  playwright  mentioned  David's 
share  in  the  production.  Then  they  gathered  some 
heart,  but  that  was  out  of  sheer  patriotism — a  sort 
of  &  bas  les  eir angers  sentiment;  and  the  people  in 
the  stalls  below  laughed  as  they  began  to  gather 
their  belongings  together  and  to  crowd  out  into 
the  gangways. 

David  rose  from  his  chair,  with  a  long  breath  of 
relief,  and  turned  to  put  Mrs.  Harrington's  lace 
cloak  over  her  shoulders.  She  looked  up  into  his 
face  with  a  little  mischievous  laugh. 

"Well,  debutant?"  she  asked. 

"Well,  we  seem  to  have  won, "said  David,  sim 
ply.  ' '  Let's  congratulate  each  other.  I  feel  rather 
pleased  and  rather  tired.  How  do  you  feel  ?" 

' '  Hungry ! ' '  said  she.  ' '  Let's  get  on  to  the  Savoy 
at  once,  instead  of  waiting  for  Charlie!  We'll  send 
a  message  back  for  him  to  come  on  after  us.  I'm 
always  hungry  on  first  nights.  I  expect  it's  because 
I'm  too  nervous  to  have  eaten  any  dinner." 

David  went  into  the  little  anteroom  of  the  box 
to  get  his  hat  and  coat,  and  Miss  Violet  Winter 
stood  in  the  doorway.  The  other  members  of  her 
party  were  talking  and  laughing  beyond  as  they 
got  into  their  wraps.  David  went  quickly  up  to 


A    STUMBLING-BLOCK 

her,  and  she  took  his  two  hands  and  held  them  fast, 
looking  into  his  face. 

"Oh,  David,  David!"  she  said,  in  a  whisper. 

"You've  made  me  cry!"  she  said.  And  David 
saw  that  her  eyes  were,  indeed,  reddened  the  very 
least  in  the  world. 

"Your  play  has  made  me  cry,  David,"  said  she. 
' '  And  I  haven't  cried  in  a  long  time. ' '  David  smiled 
down  to  her. 

"Oh,  I  mustn't  take  the  credit  for  that,"  he  an 
swered.  "That  was  Harrington  and  the  others. 
Don't  give  it  all  to  me!" 

"No,  it  was  you!"  she  insisted.  "You  made  the 
thing.  They  only  played  what  you  gave  them  to 
play.  You've  made  me  cry!"  She  seemed  to 
attach  an  extraordinary  importance  to  that,  and 
David  wondered  a  little  why  she  should  regard  a 
sympathetic  tear  as  an  event,  but  her  sympathy 
touched  him  very  keenly.  He  realized  at  that 
moment  that  he  cared  very  much  more  for  her 
approval  than  for  the  approval  of  any  one  else  in 
London,  or  perhaps  any  one  else  in  the  world. 

The  smile  left  his  lips,  and  he  looked  down  at  her 
gravely,  in  the  half-light. 

"  It's  good,  then,  is  it?"  he  asked. 

"Oh  yes,  David,  it's  good!"  said  she.  "It's  an 
other  step  up  the  ladder  for  you,  isn't  it?" 

"Oh  yes  —  yes  —  I  suppose  so,"  he  replied, 
slowly. 

"  And  I'm  glad,  glad!"  she  cried,  under  her  breath. 
"Oh,  you're  going  to  the  very  top,  and  I'm  glad!" 

148 


A    STUMBLING-BLOCK 

But  her  face  changed  a  little  at  that,  and  she  drew 
her  hands  away,  still  looking  into  his  eyes. 

"Where  shall  I  be,  though,"  she  questioned, 
"when  you've  come  to  the  top?" 

David  gave  a  sudden  exclamation.  Something 
stirred  deeply  within  him,  and  a  swift  flush  came 
to  his  face.  His  hands  went  out  after  the  hands 
that  the  girl  had  withdrawn.  But,  as  if  she  were 
all  at  once  afraid  of  what  she  had  roused,  Miss 
Winter  drew  farther  away  from  him,  holding  her 
arms  close  to  her  breast.  She  began  a  nervous 
laugh. 

"Where  are  you  —  going  from  here?"  she  de 
manded,  in  another  tone. 

David's  hands  dropped  beside  him. 

' '  On  to  the  Savoy, ' '  he  answered.  ' '  The  Harring 
tons  have  a  party.  Where  do  you  go  ?"  t 

"The  Savoy,  too,  I  believe,"  said  Miss  Winter. 
' '  I  shall  probably  see  you  later  on,  then.  In  any 
case,  come  to  Green  Street  to-morrow,  if  you  can. 
I  shall  expect  you."  The  people  of  her  party  were 
calling  out  to  her  from  the  passage  beyond,  and  she 
turned  away  to  them.  David  very  soberly  watched 
her  go  until  she  was  hidden  from  his  sight  among 
the  throng. 


CHAPTER   XIV 

HE  remained  in  London  less  than  a  week  after 
the  first  night  of  "The  Walls  of  Destiny." 
For  three  days  and  nights  they  were  all  very  busy 
with  revising  and  altering  certain  minor  points  in 
the  play  which  at  the  opening  performance  had 
seemed  not  to  "get  over  the  foot-lights,"  as  the 
stage  phrase  goes,  or  which  had  been  pounced  upon 
and  condemned  by  the  gentlemen  of  the  press. 
The  press  had  been,  on  the  whole,  rather  severe 
with*  the  piece,  bewailing  the  fact  that  Mr.  Har 
rington  had  seen  fit  to  devote  his  talents  once  more 
to  that  overworked  field  of  modern  pseudo-ro 
mance  ;  but  Harrington  laughed  over  this  to  David. 

"Just  you  sit  tight,"  he  said,  "and  don't  read 
too  much.  Look  at  the  advance  bookings  for  the 
next  fortnight.  They'll  give  you  better  reading 
than  the  newspapers.  This  play  is  a  success.  So 
don't  you  worry." 

So  they  pruned  and  perfected  it  and  rehearsed  it 
day  and  night,  until  no  more  could  be  done  to  con 
tribute  to  its  well-being;  and  then  David,  putting 
the  whole  thing  out  of  his  mind,  hurried  away,  for 
the  plot  of  his  new  novel  was  alive  in  him  and  cry 
ing  aloud  to  be  dealt  with. 


A    STUMBLING-BLOCK 

He  did  not  see  Miss  Winter  again  before  he  left 
London.  As  has  been  said,  he  was,  for  the  first  two 
or  three  days,  buried  in  work  from  morning  almost 
to  morning  again,  and  when  at  last  he  managed  to 
call  in  Green  Street,  Miss  Winter  was  not  at  home. 
He  tried  again  with  the  same  ill  success,  and  then 
wrote  asking  when  he  might  see  her;  but  she  an 
swered  him  rather  evasively,  saying  that  she  was 
leaving  town  for  a  Saturday  to  Monday  and  was  to 
be  very,  very  busy  for  a  few  days  upon  her  return. 
David  read  the  note  with  a  little  laugh  of  angry 
astonishment,  for  of  course  it  was  plain  that  the 
girl  was  deliberately  avoiding  him.  He  wrote  a 
very  brief  reply,  saying  that  he  regretted  his  ill 
luck,  and  setting  down  the  address  of  his  bankers, 
who  would  forward  letters  to  him  wherever  he 
might  be.  Then  he  packed  his  trunk  and  took 
the  night  train  for  Paris. 

He  went  to  a  little  village  which  he  had  visited 
once  before  with  a  friend  of  his  who  was  a  painter 
of  paysage — a  tiny  hamlet  near  the  farther  border 
of  the  forest  of  Fontainebleau,  a  mere  huddle  of 
squat,  white-plastered  houses  which  sat  beside  a 
lazy  river  in  a  crease  of  the  rolling  plain.  There 
was  an  ancient  inn  with  a  beautiful,  deep  garden 
sloping  in  terraces  down  to  the  river's  edge;  there 
were  clumsy,  flat-bottomed  boats  to  go  upon  the 
water  —  bateaux  de  peche  et  de  promenade;  there 
was  a  little  rustic  summer-house  set  upon  a  knoll 
in  the  garden,  where,  surrounded  by  a  grave  circle 
of  cats,  one  dined  in  the  open  as  the  sweet  dusk 


A   STUMBLING-BLOCK 

swept  down;  there  was  a  tattered  white  peacock 
and  a  little  patient  ass  who  sang  together  at  sun 
rise  to  wake  one  up;  there  were  fruitful  fields  and 
woodlands  where  live  things  stirred  and  rustled  in 
the  underbrush ;  there  were  stolid,  ruminating  cat 
tle  in  the  meadows,  and  stolid,  ruminating  peasants, 
sabot-shod,  in  the  village  streets  or  upon  the  old 
stone  bridge  which  the  Prussians  half  destroyed  in 
'70.  And  everywhere  there  was  a  still  peace — in 
the  garden,  in  the  fields,  along  the  shaded  back 
waters  of  the  little  river,  even  in  the  cobbled  streets 
of  the  village. 

David  looked  upon  it  all  and  saw  that  it  was 
good,  and  that  he  should  do  good  work  there.  He 
stayed  through  the  months  of  June  and  July,  and 
the  novel  grew  under  his  busy  hand  almost  with 
the  keen,  free  joy  that  had  brought  into  being  The 
Walls  of  Destiny  a  year  before — almost.  He  never 
felt  again  an  ecstasy  quite  so  sweet  and  poignant 
and  enduring  as  that  first  labor  of  love  beside  the 
gray  northern  sea.  Such  do  not  come  twice  to 
any  man. 

He  worked  through  the  day  either  in  the  fragrant 
garden  or  stretched  in  one  of  the  flat  bateaux  de 
promenade,  drawn  up  in  a  still,  green-shaded  back 
water  of  the  stream ;  and  at  night,  when  the  peasant 
world  was  housed  and  asleep,  he  walked  the  country 
roads  with  his  face  turned  to  the  starlit  gloom  of 
the  sky.  Nightingales  sang  their  hearts  out  to  him 
from  a  thicket;  little  lady  glowworms  lighted 
small  green  lamps  about  his  feet  in  unmaidenly 


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lure  to  their  friends  of  the  other  sex ;  tiny,  hidden 
beasts  squeaked  from  the  road-side  or  dashed  away 
among  the  trees  in  terror  at  his  step;  the  sweet, 
velvet  darkness,  cool  and  fresh  and  odorous,  pressed 
his  face  with  its  gentle  fingers,  and  peace  settled 
upon  the  man's  heart  and  dwelt  there,  peace  and 
forgetfulness  of  all  the  world  save  the  little  mimic 
world  which  his  brain  was  spinning,  and  which  was 
a  pleasant  world  to  him,  full  of  joy — not  that  torture 
which  it  is  to  many  creative  souls — to  David  him 
self  at  times  other  than  this. 

But  there  was  one  being  of  that  outer  alien 
world  whom  David  did  not  forget.  Violet  Winter 
was  much  in  his  thoughts  during  these  months. 
He  had  quite  recovered  from  his  brief  anger  at  her 
for  refusing  to  see  him  in  London.  Indeed,  she 
had  written  to  him  a  week  afterwards,  begging  him 
to  forgive  her  in  that  matter.  She  had  confessed 
that  her  action  was  due  to  sheer  pique  over  his  not 
making  an  opportunity  to  come  to  her  for  an  hour 
while  he  was  busy  with  the  revision  of  his  play. 
She  turned  a  mocking  laugh  upon  herself  over  her 
childishness,  and  it  was  impossible  for  David  not 
to  laugh  also  and  straightway  forgive.  Truth  to 
tell,  he  had  felt  a  small  personal  guilt  in  not  man 
aging  a  half-hour  with  her  out  of  that  first  day  of 
labor,  though  it  had  been  all  but  impossible. 

He  had  leisure  during  these  long,  quiet  days  and 
nights  in  the  country  to  look  upon  Violet  Winter 
and  upon  his  relations  with  her  with  calm,  apprais 
ing  eyes  free  from  distraction.  And  as  he  reflected 


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it  filled  him  with  a  grave  surprise  to  find  how  much 
she  had  been  in  his  life  for  the  past  year — indeed, 
for  longer  than  that:  ever  since  that  dinner  at  the 
Farings  in  New  York,  when  she  had  let  him  see  a 
little  way  under  the  mask  which  she  habitually 
wore.  He  did  not  in  the  least  retreat  from  the 
position  which  he  had  assumed  long  before.  He 
heartily  disliked  and  distrusted  the  type  which  he 
felt  this  girl  represented,  but  the  girl  herself  was 
very  attractive  to  him.  He  had  said  to  himself  in 
the  theatre  in  London  that  he  cared  more  for  her 
opinion  of  his  work  than  for  the  opinion  of  any  one 
else  in  the  world;  but  now,  facing  the  matter  as 
dispassionately  as  he  was  able,  it  became  plain  to 
him  that  that  was  not  all  the  truth.  He  cared 
most  for  her  opinion  in  all  things — his  work,  him 
self,  the  universe  in  general. 

Just  how  near  he  was  to  loving  her  it  would 
be  impossible  to  say.  He  shirked  that  himself. 
Doubtless  his  feeling  was  compounded  of  many 
things  (as  most  feelings  are) ,  of  a  flattering  sense  of 
gratification  that  a  young  woman  so  socially  popu 
lar,  so  much  sought  after,  should  choose  him  out 
from  all  men  for  unusual  intimacy,  should  so  defer 
to  him,  seek  his  beliefs,  his  thoughts,  and  make 
them  her  own;  of  a  realization  that  a  very  lovely 
and  unhappy  woman  had,  of  her  own  will,  come 
to  him  for  comfort  and  for  help  (which  is  very  dear 
to  the  heroic  heart  of  man) ;  a  conviction  that  she, 
more  than  any  one  living,  had  power  to  spur  him 
to  his  best  endeavors,  to  cheer  him  in  dark  hours, 


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to  preserve  him  from  errant  courses,  to  crown  him 
when  he  had  wrought  well. 

Out  of  the  mass  of  conjecture  one  fact  seems  to 
loom  sufficiently  clear.  Whatever  was  the  sum  of 
his  feeling  it  had  in  it  no  mighty  sweep  of  passion ; 
it  seems  to  have  been  no  swift  homing  flight  of  soul 
to  soul,  no  loud,  sure  cry  across  the  space  and  dark 
ness  of  mate  to  mate. 

Whatever  it  was,  though,  without  doubt  it  moved 
and  stirred  him — at  least  to  a  great  deal  of  thought. 

Towards  the  end  of  July  he  wrote  "finis"  to  his 
summer's  work,  sent  off  the  manuscript  in  a  great 
parcel  to  New  York  to  be  typed  and  delivered  to 
the  publishers  (John  Cowper  had  bespoken  an 
option  upon  it  for  his  house),  and  turned  his  steps 
to  Switzerland,  where  he  spent  a  strenuous  and 
entirely  happy  August  in  Zermatt  and  the  Grindel- 
wald  valley,  climbing.  He  was  preparing  to  get 
back  to  Paris,  when  a  letter  was  sent  on  to  him,  by 
his  bankers,  from  Violet  Winter.  Her  aunt,  Mrs. 
Hawtrey,  had  come  over  in  July  to  join  her,  and 
the  two,  it  appeared,  had  also  been  in  Switzerland, 
but  in  the  Engadine,  while  David  was  busy  on  his 
snow-peaks.  They  were  now  in  Wiesbaden  for  a 
few  days,  and  meant  to  sail  for  America  on  one  of 
the  Lloyds'  from  Bremen,  September  loth.  Miss 
Winter  asked  David  when  he  meant  to  go  home, 
and  suggested  that,  if  the  time  was  suitable  to  his 
plans,  he  might  try  to  book  on  their  ship. 

David  immediately  wrote  to  her  that  he  would 
try,  and  also  wrote  to  Bremen  asking  if  he  could 


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be  booked  on  this  steamer.  He  found  that  he  could 
get  a  very  good  room  which  had  been,  at  the 
eleventh  hour,  forfeited;  and  September  loth  the 
three  met  in  Bremen  and  went  together  on  board 
ship. 

"I'm  far  from  sure  that  this  isn't  very  rash  of 
me,"  the  girl  said,  "for  if  we  should  happen  to  have 
a  bad  passage  I  shall  be  very,  very  ill.  And  a  man 
hates  that,  doesn't  he  ?  But  I'll  make  you  a  solemn 
promise  to  remain  invisible  so  long  as  I'm  feeling 
below  the  mark.  We  may  have  smooth  seas,  and 
if  so  it  will  be  very  nice.  I  always  feel  at  my  best 
at  sea,  unless  I'm  desperately  ill." 

As  it  happened,  they  had  an  excellent  passage, 
with  almost  no  rough  weather  at  all,  so  that  Miss 
Winter  was  forced  to  remain  invisible  for  only  a 
part  of  one  day.  During  the  remainder  of  the  time 
she  was,  as  she  had  foretold,  at  her  best,  and  the 
two,  in  that  long-continued  intimacy  which  life  at 
sea  enforces,  came  closer  together  than  they  had 
ever  been.  Of  Mrs.  Hawtrey  David  saw  nothing 
whatever  between  embarkation  and  landing.  She 
retired  to  her  cabin  before  the  ship  left  Bremen, 
and  emerged  as  it  was  making  its  slow  way  up  the 
North  River  to  its  pier.  So  the  two  younger  people 
were  left  quite  to  their  own  devices.  They  walked 
a  great  many  miles  round  the  promenade-deck ;  they 
played  childish  games  of  shovel-board  and  ring- toss, 
and  quarrelled  over  them;  they  sat  for  hours  to 
gether  in  the  sun  and  the  keen  wind  until  they  were 
burned  brown,  and  they  tried  to  read  books  out  of 

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the  ship's  library,  and  gave  it  up,  because  reading 
bored  them. 

Miss  Winter  showed  David  an  entirely  new  side 
of  her  in  these  quiet  days — a  childlike  side  which 
he  had  never  before  seen;  an  inconsequent  and 
almost  feverish  gayety  which  was  very  unlike  her 
normal  self  and  which,  in  truth,  sat  rather  strangely 
upon  her.  She  had  the  air  of  one  who  has,  with  a 
prodigious  effort,  thrown  cares  and  troubles  and  all 
serious  things  behind,  and  has  set  in  to  play  without 
restraint  or  scruple — but  who  does  not  know  quite 
how  to  play.  The  mood  rang  a  little  false,  but 
David  welcomed  it  for  all  that.  If  the  girl's  eager 
ness  to  be  young,  as  she  had  never  been,  to  put 
away  all  her  old  bitter  cynicism,  was  a  little  piteous 
in  its  awkwardness,  still  he  was  glad  of  the  attempt. 
At  any  rate  she  had  broken  with  the  old  gods,  or 
was  trying  so  to  do. 

They  reached  Sandy  Hook  early  one  evening  as 
the  dusk  was  coming  down.  It  was  too  late  to 
land  that  night,  and  so  the  great  ship  steamed 
inside  the  Hook  and  anchored  in  the  lower  bay. 
There  were  curses  from  many  of  the  men,  who  re 
sented  being  shut  up  on  shipboard  for  another  long 
night  almost  within  sight  of  home ;  and  there  were 
wails  from  the  women,  who  naively  pictured  a 
throng  of  friends  and  relatives  waiting  impatiently 
through  the  night  hours  for  the  ship  which  did  not 
come.  But  certain  cheerfuller  and  more  philosoph 
ical  souls  soothed  and  smoothed  abraded  tempers, 


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and,  after  dinner,  got  up  a  scratch  concert  in  the 
saloon  to  while  away  some  of  the  final  hours  of 
imprisonment. 

The  pilot  had  brought  on  board  a  bundle  of  news 
papers  and  a  small  sack  of  letters  and  telegrams. 
There  were  two  letters  for  David,  and  he  read  them 
standing  over  the  locked  and  strapped  steamer- 
trunk  in  his  cabin.  They  were  letters  of  congratu 
lation  and  good  cheer,  both  of  them ;  one  from  the 
house  which  had,  on  the  first  of  this  very  month, 
brought  out  his  little  novelette.  The  writer,  the 
secretary  of  the  company,  wished  to  be  the  first  to 
greet  him  on  his  return  to  America  with  the  news 
that  the  little  book  had  made  an  immediate  and 
gratifying  success,  that  two  editions  of  five  thou 
sand  each  had  already  been  exhausted,  and  the 
presses  were  busy  with  a  third. 

The  other  letter  was  almost  as  brief  and  quite  as 
welcome.  It  was  from  John  Cowper,  stating,  like 
the  former,  that  he  wished  to  be  the  first  to  greet 
David,  upon  his  return,  with  good  news:  the  new 
novel  had  been  accepted  for  publication  by  their 
house,  and  an  excellent  serial  arrangement  had 
been  made  for  it.  He  asked  David  to  pay  an  early 
call  at  the  office. 

David  put  the  letters  away  in  his  pocket  with  a 
pleased,  excited  little  laugh.  That  was  good  news, 
indeed,  to  return  to!  Another  step  up  the  ladder, 
as  Violet  Winter  would  have  put  it,  and  a  long  step 
this  time.  He  had  been  rather  sorry  for  the  voyage 
to  end ;  it  had  been  so  unusually  pleasant,  and  the 

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prospect  ahead  of  him,  upon  landing,  such  an  end 
less  monotony  of  work!  But  this  changed  the 
whole  thing  and  made  him  agreeably  eager  for 
morning  to  come. 

He  went  out  and  along  the  narrow  gangway 
between  the  double  row  of  cabins  to  the  chief 
companionway,  amidships,  where  was  the  entrance 
to  the  dining-saloon.  The  impromptu  concert  was 
going  on  in  there,  and  groups  of  people  sat  about 
the  long  tables.  Some  one  finished  a  song  just  as 
David  came  near,  and  the  people  about  the  tables 
applauded  and  called  out  for  an  encore.  He  found 
Violet  Winter  standing  by  one  of  the  saloon  doors 
looking  in  over  the  shoulders  of  two  or  three  stew 
ards,  and  she  turned  and  nodded  to  him  cheerfully 
when  he  spoke. 

"You  missed  a  very  good  song,"  she  said. 
"That  German  girl  with  the  voice  like  a  man  has 
been  singing  'Lehne  Deine  Wange  am  Meine  Wange,' 
and  singing  it  gorgeously." 

David  explained  that  he  had  been  packing  up  his 
things,  leaving  only  a  dressing-bag  open. 

"Let's  get  out  of  this,  on  deck!"  he  proposed. 
"  It's  abominably  hot  here  since  we  came  to  anchor. 
There's  no  breeze."  So  they  went  up  and  out  on 
the  upper  promenade  -  deck,  which  was  deserted 
save  for  a  steward  who  was  stacking  the  chairs  for 
the  night  and  carrying  in  the  rugs  which  had  been 
left  about  the  deck.  The  tide  must  have  been 
making  in,  for  they  found  that  the  ship  had  swung 
completely  about  to  her  huge  bow  anchor,  and  lay 


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headed  to  the  gloom  of  the  open  sea  as  if  ready 
once  more  for  the  long  voyage.  Astern,  the  low 
shores  were  dotted  with  yellow  pin-points  of  light — 
Staten  Island  and  the  Jersey  shore  to  the  left,  and 
to  the  right  the  long  rows  of  electrics  that  marked 
Coney  Island  and  Rockaway. 

"Let's  go  out  in  the  stern!"  the  girl  suggested. 
' '  The  breeze  is  from  that  way — a  land  breeze,  and 
we  shall  be  a  few  yards  nearer  home.  Not  that  I 
care,"  she  added,  as  they  went  down  the  ladder  to 
the  main-deck  and  along  that  past  the  great  steam- 
winches.  "I'm  rather  sorry,  you  know.  It  has 
been  a  nice  voyage — a  dear  voyage.  Yes,  I'm  sorry 
it's  done  with — for  the  first  time.  Usually  I  am 
desperately  glad  to  get  ashore." 

"I'm  sorry,  too,"  said  David.  "I  was  thinking 
just  that  a  few  minutes  ago.  Then  some  business 
letters  came  by  the  pilot  and  broke  the  spell — made 
me  anxious  to  get  back  into  harness.  I'm  such  an 
industrious  person!"  he  said,  laughing. 

But  Miss  Winter  looked  up  at  him  with  a  serious 
little  nod. 

' '  Yes,  you  are,  aren't  you  ?"  she  agreed.  ' '  You're 
amazingly  industrious  without  looking  the  part  in 
"the  least.  You  look  as  if  you  never  did  anything 
but  loaf  about  and  play  bridge.  Most  industrious 
people  have  such  a  nervous,  harassed  look.  I'm 
very  glad  you're  not  that  type." 

They  came  aloft  the  little  deck-house  which 
sheltered  the  ponderous  steam  steering-gear,  and 
reached  the  taffrail  where  the  log  no  longer  sagged 

1 60 


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and  spun,  and  that  interminable  turmoil  of  up- 
churned  foam  was  at  last  still.  A  young  woman, 
evidently  one  of  the  second-class  passengers,  had 
been  leaning  upon  the  rail,  alone  ther.e  in  the  dark, 
but  she  turned  away  as  they  approached.  The 
pilot  would  seem  to  have  brought  her  news  also, 
for  she  held  a  letter  crumpled  in  one  hand ;  but  the 
news  could  not  have  been  pleasant  news,  like  David's, 
because  it  was  plain  to  see  that  the  young  woman 
was  weeping  very  bitterly,  though  in  perfect  silence. 

She  went  round  the  farther  side  of  the  deck 
house,  still  clutching  that  crumpled  letter  in  her 
hand,  and  David  took  a  step  after  her  and  halted. 

' '  Oh,  I  say ! "  he  exclaimed.  David  was  ever  very 
quick  to  sympathy.  "She  was — crying,"  he  said. 
"Did  you  see  that?  She'd  come  off  here  alone  in 
the  dark  to  cry,  and  we — drove  her  out  like  brutes ! 
I  say!  She  had  a  letter  in  her  hand.  Did  you  see 
it?  She's  had  bad  news,  I  expect,  poor  girl!  I 
wish  we  hadn't  driven  her  away.  I  feel  such  a 
beast."  He  turned  slowly  back  to  Miss  Winter, 
but  his  face,  in  the  half -gloom,  was  troubled.  "  I — 
hate  to  see  people  in  trouble  like  that, ' '  he  went  on, 
half-apologetically.  "I  hate  to  see  a  woman  creep 
off  to  a  corner  like  this  to  cry.  One  wants  so  to  do 
something,  and  of  course  there's  nothing  one  can 
do.  I  wish  we  hadn't  driven  her  away,  though." 

"We  can  go  back,"  said  Miss  Winter,  a  little 
coldly.  "Though  I  expect  the  poor  woman  is  in 
her  cabin  by  this  time.  Yes,  I'm  sorry  about  it, 
too.  She  looked  very  wretched.  But,  of  course, 

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as  you  say,  there's  nothing  that  one  can  do.  If 
one  stopped  to  think  of  the  amount  of  piteous 
misery  there  is  in  this  world  one  would  simply  go 
mad,  I  should  think.  We  have  to  be  selfish  beasts 
in  common  self-defence." 

She  leaned  over  the  broad  rail  and  turned  her 
face  to  the  little  cool  breeze  which  bore  down  the 
bay  from  Staten  Island  and  the  Jersey  meadows 
beyond. 

"Almost  at  home!"  she  said,  presently,  in  a  slow 
voice.  "Almost  through  the  doorway  and  into  the 
old  life  again  after  our  fairy  voyage.  Smell  that 
breeze!  It  isn't  a  clean,  pure,  sea  breeze  any  more; 
it  reeks  of  the  shore  and  of  low-tide  things  and  de 
cay.  Oh,  David,"  she  exclaimed,  "our  voyage  has 
been  very,  very  dear!  I  hate  so  to  have  it  ended. 
I've  been  quite  another  being  for  seven  days. 
Haven't  I?  Haven't  I?" 

"Yes,"  said  David,  simply. 

"A  nicer  being,"  she  continued.  "A  younger, 
simpler  one.  Oh,  I  loved  it!  And  now  it's  done 
with,  and  we  go  back  to  realities,  you  to  your  work 
and  I  to  my  round  of  things.  I'm  sick  to  death  of 
my  round  of  things,  David.  Will  you  be  a  little 
sorry  for  me,  please?"  She  turned  to  him  sudden 
ly,  staring  up  into  his  face  in  the  starlight.  "You 
have  so  much  to  live  for,  to  hope  for!"  she  cried. 
"So  much  to  plan  and  work  for!  You're  already 
thinking  of  a  dozen  things  that  you  must  do  to 
morrow  and  wondering  which  of  them  ought  to  be 
done  first ;  and  they're  all  things  that  mean  some- 

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thing,  lead  to  something,  help  you  on  your  upward 
way.  I  wonder  if  you're  sufficiently  glad  and  grate 
ful  for  that — for  real  living  interests,  for  a  ladder  to 
climb,  a  world  to  fight  and  conquer.  "  Are  you?" 

David  frowned  down  upon  her  with  troubled 
eyes.  "I — don't  know,"  he  said,  slowly.  "I've 
been  too  busy  to  think  of  it.  I  don't  know." 

A  little  tug-boat  puffed  noisily  past,  bound  south, 
inside  the  Hook,  towards  the  mouth  of  the  Shrews 
bury.  The  night  was  so  still  that  they  heard  the 
men  on  board  talking.  One  of  them  spat,  and 
inquired  what  that  damn,  hulking  liner  was,  and 
another  man  said  he  didn't  know,  but  he  thought 
it  was  one  of  the  Dootchmen.  Then  the  first  man 
said  speaking  of  Dootchmen  reminded  him  of  a 
story.  But  as  they  passed  down-wind  their  voices 
grew  too  faint  for  David  or  Miss  Winter  to  hear. 

From  forward,  through  the  open  ports  of  the 
saloon,  there  came  a  sudden  outburst  of  handclap- 
ping,  then  silence,  and  then  the  notes  of  a  piano, 
faint  with  the  distance,  and  the  high,  sweet  voice 
of  a  woman  singing  "Loch  Lomond." 

Miss  Winter  gave  a  sudden  dry  sob. 

"Oh,  must  I  have  that  to  add  to  my  troubles?" 
she  said.  ' ' '  Loch  Lomond '  always  makes  me  cry. ' ' 
She  beat  her  two  hands  together.  "  David,  David! 
I  don't  want  to  go  home.  Can't  you  make  them 
weigh  anchor  and  go  out  to  sea  again  ?  Anywhere! 
I  don't  want  to  go  home  and  have  our  voyage  end!" 

Something  all  at  once  set  David's  heart  to  shak 
ing  within  him,  set  his  head  to  a  fevered  whirl. 

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Violet  looked  up  into  his  eyes  through  the  dark, 
and  his  arms  went  out  to  her  stiffly. 

"It  sha'n't!"  he  murmured,  in  an  odd,  breathless 
whisper.  "  It  sha'n't — end !"  His  arms  closed  round 
her,  and  she  came  to  him,  but  for  an  instant  she  held 
herself  away,  pressing  her  hands  upon  his  breast, 
her  face,  very  white  and  still,  close  under  his  face. 

"Do  you  want  me,  David?"  she  asked,  whisper 
ing,  and  stared  into  his  eyes  through  the  gloom.  In 
the  darkness  her  own  eyes  were  but  deep  shadows 
to  him — shadows  in  a  pallid  face.  "Oh,  David,  do 
you  want  me?"  she  cried,  under  her  breath;  and 
David's  tongue  struggled  with  the  paralysis  which 
gripped  at  it. 

"More  than — anything!"  he  answered;  and  the 
strength  went  suddenly  out  of  the  girl's  arms,  so 
that  she  leaned  drooping  against  him,  with  her 
face  hidden  under  the  hollow  of  his  chin,  and  he 
felt  her  beginning  to  shake  with  great  sobs. 

An  hour  later  he  left  her  at  the  companionway 
amidships.  There  was  no  one  about,  for  the  con 
cert  was  still  going  on  below,  and  those  who  were 
not  engaged  with  it  were  in  their  cabins  packing 
their  bags  and  boxes.  The  girl  lifted  her  face  to 
him  and  David  kissed  her. 

"I  am  entirely  mad,"  he  said,  with  a  little,  un 
certain  laugh,  "and  I  rather  think  I'm  a  bit  of  a 
scoundrel,  but  I — I  want  you  more  than  anything. 
I  can't  seem  to  weigh  the  other  matters  against 
that." 

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"What  do  you  mean  by  'scoundrel'?"  she  de 
manded.  "  Why  do  you  say  that  you  think  you're 
a  bit  of  a  scoundrel?" 

David  shrugged  his  shoulders. 

"Well,  I'm  a  sort  of  penniless  adventurer,"  said 
he.  "  Am  I  not  ?  You  wouldn't  find  many  people 
who'd  consider  me  exactly  an  eligible."  But  Miss 
Winter  frowned. 

"Oh,  please  never  say  anything  like  that  again!" 
she  said.  "  Don't  be  American,  and  absurd.  As  a 
matter  of  fact,  you're  making  a  very  good  income, 
indeed,  now,  and  you'll  probably  go  on  making 
more  and  more;  but  if  you  never  should  make 
another  sou,  you  know  that  I  have  enough  for  both 
of  us.  So  don't  be  silly.  If  you  should  ever  let 
such  a  question  as  that  come  between  us  in  any 
littlest  way  I  should  be  frightfully  disappointed  in 
you,  and  almost  sorry  I —  No,  no!  not  that, 
David!"  She  leaned  her  head  against  his  shoulder 
for  a  single  swift  instant.  "You're  giving  me  a 
new,  new  life,  David!"  she  whispered.  "Oh,  if 
you're  sure  you  want  me,  nothing  else  matters!" 

Then  she  went  away  and  left  him,  but  David 
tramped  for  hours,  till  the  concert  below  was  over 
and  the  lights  were  out,  and  at  last  the  sailormen 
came  with  hose  and  swabs  to  wash  the  deck,  and 
he  had  to  retreat  before  them. 

He  went  astern  again  to  the  rail  aloft  the  little 
deck-house,  and  stood  there  staring  through  the 
dark  with  eyes  that  did  not  see.  His  brain  was  a 
whirling  stupor  which  would  not  clearly  set  before 

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him  the  great  new  fac*ts  of  his  life.  He  was  unable 
to  frame  coherent  thought.  Somewhere  within  the 
tumult  he  was  conscious  of  a  new  and  unfamiliar 
sweetness  which  at  intervals  came  to  the  surface 
of  his  mind  and  for  an  instant  thrilled  him.  Then 
there  was  a  fear,  a  sort  of  stabbing,  sick  panic ;  and 
over  and  through  the  sweetness  and  the  bewilder 
ment  and  the  panic  a  vast,  vague  sense  of  outrage 
done  to  something  ancient  and  inviolate — what,  his 
mazed  brain  could  not  determine.  It  has  been  said 
that  he  could  not  frame  a  coherent  thought. 

So  he  stood,  staring  landward,  and  his  universe 
spun  and  wheeled  before  him  against  the  night, 
and  would  not  be  set  in  decency  or  order  though  he 
strove  till  his  brow  was  wet. 

It  must  have  been  after  a  long  time  that  his  tired 
eyes  observed,  without  surprise  or  great  interest,  a 
natural  phenomenon :  a  star  fell  and  shot  down  the 
midnight  sky,  leaving  a  trail  of  fiery  splendor. 
Then,  presently,  another ;  and  still  another.  Three 
falling  stars!  Something  significant  about  that! 
A  vague,  thin  memory  out  of  the  forgotten  past 
stirred  him  faintly.  Where  had  he  seen  three  fall 
ing  stars  before  ? — and  when  ? 


CHAPTER  XV 

THEY  disembarked  early  in  the  morning,  and 
David  found  himself  released  from  the  cus 
toms  ruffians  and  deposited,  box  and  bag,  in  East 
Seventeenth  Street  before  ten  o'clock.  There  was 
a  fortnight's  accumulation  of  letters,  and  he  looked 
hastily  through  a  few  of  the  more  important  ones 
before  dashing  off  to  the  offices  of  his  two  pub 
lishers.  One  letter  brought  him  a  slight  disap 
pointment,  for  he  found  that  the  actor  who  was 
to  have  presented  "The  Walls  of  Destiny"  in 
America  had  fallen  very  ill,  and  was  not  expected  to 
return  to  the  stage  for  some  months.  The  produc 
tion,  therefore,  was  put  off  until  spring,  with  a  possi 
bility  of  still  further  postponement.  The  American 
manager,  wisely  pinning  his  faith  to  the  London 
success,  had  engaged  for  his  country  the  same 
dramatization  of  the  book  as  that  used  in  London 
by  Charles  Harrington. 

Another  of  the  letters  was  from  Robert  Henley. 
The  old  gentleman  wrote  that  he  was  a  bit  indis 
posed,  but  that  he  looked  forward  to  making  a 
brief  visit  in  New  York  within  a  few  weeks.  He 
wanted  to  see  for  himself,  he  said,  how  well  David 
was  bearing  success. 

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David  laughed  at  that,  and  nodded  his  head  on 
the  letter  in  great  satisfaction.  He  was  glad  that 
old  Robert  was  coming  to  see  him.  He  counted 
back  over  the  months  past  and  was  mildly  astonish 
ed  to  find  that  the  two  had  not  seen  each  other  for 
nearly  eighteen  months.  He  had  been  too  busy 
to  realize  how  long  a  time  had  passed  since  that 
visit  of  a  year  and  a  half  previous. 

"I  wonder,"  he  said,  thoughtfully,  "why  Uncle 
Robert  never  suggests  my  coming  to  Croydon.  I 
wonder  if  he  thinks  I  should  be  bored  there — or 
what  he  thinks  about  it.  It's  rather  odd."  He 
had  himself,  once  or  twice  during  the  previous 
year,  said  something  in  his  letters  about  trying  to 
manage  a  week  or  two  in  Croydon;  the  journey  to 
the  little  town  in  the  Genesee  Valley  was  not  a 
long  one.  But  old  Robert  had  either  taken  no 
notice  of  this  in  his  replies,  or  had  treated  the  sug 
gestion  in  a  light  and  very  indefinite  way.  Then, 
too,  David's  summers,  the  season  which  he  would 
have  been  most  likely  to  choose  for  a  visit,  had 
taken  him  far  away,  the  first  to  Maine  and  the  next 
to  England  and  France,  so  that  chance  as  well  as 
Robert  Henley's  curious  indifference  had  played 
against  him. 

"I  must  go  there  next  spring,"  he  said  to  him 
self,  looking  up  from  old  Robert's  letter.  "  In  May, 
when  the  maples  along  Main  Street  are  out  in  full 
leaf,  and  the  lilacs  in  the  front  yards  are  in  bloom, 
and  the  early  flowers  are  coming  in  the  gardens. 
By  Jove!"  He  closed  his  eyes  and  the  scent  of 

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Main  Street  came  to  him:  damp  turf  and  moss 
under  that  sheltering  canopy  of  foliage,  a  whiff  of 
fragrance  from  the  flowering  shrubs  behind  the 
low,  painted  palings,  a  spice  of  fir  and  balsam — all 
the  blended  essence  of  green  summer  things,  the 
exquisite  home-smell  that  was  never  to  be  forgotten. 
It  came  to  him  sweet  and  true,  keen  as  sharp  pain, 
and  David's  eyes  stung  suddenly  with  tears. 

"I'll  go,  by  Jove!"  he  said.  "I'll  go  in  the 
spring,  when  it's  all  greenest  and  sweetest.  It's 
home,  and  I — "  Another  different  pang  shot 
through  him,  a  pang  of  recollection,  and  he  almost 
cried  out — Violet! 

"No,  I — I  forgot!"  he  said,  in  another  tone. 
"No,  I  fancy  she  wouldn't  quite  care  for  it.  I 
forgot."  He  could  not  couple  Violet  Winter  and 
Croydon.  In  some  fashion  they  represented  to 
him  opposite  poles  of  the  universe.  He  could  not 
see  her  there  in  Main  Street.  She  didn't  belong 
there  -at  all. 

He  frowned  down  upon  old  Robert's  letter, 
thinking  of  that  great  parting  of  the  ways  which 
was  before  him,  and  thinking  of  the  way  he  had 
elected  to  follow.  He  was  very  glad,  he  knew. 
It  was,  without  a  shadow  of  doubt,  the  better  way, 
infinitely  the  better.  And  he  was  proud  and  up 
lifted  and  happy,  he  said  to  himself,  but  in  some 
vague  fashion  the  thought  of  Croydon,  though  he 
had  resolutely  withheld  from  Croydon  its  sweetest 
memory,  struck  upon  his  happiness  with  a  dis 
cordant  sound.  There  was  no  exultation  in  him. 
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After  a  little  while  he  dropped  the  letter  upon 
his  table  among  the  others  that  were  there,  and 
recalled  himself  with  an  effort  to  the  things  of  the 
day.  There  were  two  morning  calls  to  be  made, 
then  lunch,  then  the  unpacking  of  his  luggage,  and 
a  more  careful  look  over  the  little  pile  of  letters; 
then,  at  four,  he  was  to  go  to  Sixty-seventh  Street. 

He  made  his  calls,  had  lunch  with  certain  gen 
tlemen  connected  with  a  publishing  house,  and 
towards  three  o'clock  returned  to  his  letters  and 
his  unpacking. 

He  found  a  note,  in  a  familiar  hand,  which  had 
come  by  messenger.  It  was  from  Violet  Winter 
and  was  very  brief. 

"Dear,  don't  come  to-day!  I  have  a  blinding  head 
ache.  Come  to-morrow.  V." 

He  knew  what  these  violent  headaches  of  hers 
were.  They  came  on  suddenly  and  endured  for 
hours,  during  which  she  kept  to  her  bed  in  a,dark- 
ened  room  and  had  cold  water  compresses  put  over 
her  eyes  and  brow,  fresh  every  few  minutes. 

He  sent  a  return  note  to  say  how  sorry  he  was, 
and  telephoned  to  a  Broadway  florist's  shop  for  an 
armful  of  the  flowers  she  loved  best.  He  was 
humorously  aware  that  people  with  headaches 
cannot  bear  fragrant  flowers  near  them,  but  it 
seemed  the  only  tangible  way  of  expressing  his 
feeling,  and  he  knew  that  the  girl  would  be  pleased 
even  though  she  had  to  banish  the  gift  from  her 
presence. 

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For  himself,  he  was  not  altogether  sorry  to  have 
this  twenty-four  hours  of  grace  in  which  to  look 
quite  calmly  and  searchingly  into  the  new  future 
which  confronted  him.  The  thing  was  so  start- 
lingly  new,  so  wholly  unlocked  for,  that  it  was  only 
with  the  greatest  difficulty  he  could  believe  in  it. 
The  possibility  of  marriage — save  as  a  very  remote 
and  indefinite  matter  to  be  dealt  with  later  on,  a 
thing  to  be  accomplished,  say,  ten  years  hence, 
when  he  could  afford  to  slacken  a  bit  on  the  strain 
of  work  and  begin  to  look  forward  to  middle  life — 
had  not  entered  his  thoughts  at  all;  not,  at  least, 
since  Croydon  days,  and  that  was  another  life,  a 
preexistence  entirely  unconnected  with  the  present. 

Whatever  the  intimate  relationship  with  Violet 
Winter  into  which  he  had  drifted  may  have  seemed 
to  him,  it  is  certain  that  he  had  never  thought  of 
marriage  as  its  outcome.  Looking  back  at  it  now, 
as  he  sat  in  his  rooms  or  tramped  the  floor,  biting 
at  the  stem  of  his  pipe,  he  seemed  to  himself  vaguely 
to  have  regarded  it  as  something  like  one  of  those 
close  and  beautiful  friendships — historic,  many  of 
them — which  have  so  often  existed  between  busy 
men — artists,  soldiers,  statesmen — and  the  ladies 
who  have  inspired  and  encouraged  their  careers. 

A  month  before  this  day,  or  a  week,  he  would 
have  treated  the  suggestion  that  Miss  Winter  loved 
him  with  an  amazed  laugh.  That  she  trusted  and, 
in  a  fashion,  leaned  upon  him  he  had  long  known, 
and  the  flattery  of  that  knowledge  was  very  sweet. 
But  he  had  thought  of  her  as  some  one  aloof  from 

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the  common  ways  of  loving,  until  that  swift  mo 
ment  in  the  dark,  on  board  ship,  when  something 
in  each  of  the  two  all  at  once  had  set  the  other  to 
shaking,  and  the  thing  was  done. 

But  now,  since  it  was  done,  marriage  confronted 
him — "a  condition,  not  a  theory."  It  was  half 
fearful  to  him,  half  sweet,  and  altogether  very  grave 
with  new  and  important  responsibilities.  He  look 
ed  it  soberly  in  the  face,  and  if  at  first  that  other 
David,  the  artisan,  cried  out  against  its  inevitable 
bonds  and  restrictions  (fiercely  jealous,  like  old 
Robert  Henley,  of  all  that  threatened  to  hamper), 
he  silenced  the  voice,  saying  that  he  but  added  a 
new  and  exquisite  incentive  to  better  work.  That 
Violet  could  hamper  him  he  denied  with  indigna 
tion.  He  said,  a  little  belligerently,  that  she  would 
inspire  and  help,  as  she  already  had  inspired  and 
helped  during  the  past  two  years;  but  infinitely 
more. 

Ways  and  means — the  sordider  side  of  the  thing — 
came  to  torment  him,  for  he  had  to  the  full  the 
American  man's  pride  in  being  the  supporter.  But 
this  question  bade  fair  to  prove  itself  an  easy  one. 
.He  was,  as  Miss  Winter  had  said,  making  a  very 
decent  income  now,  for  his  short  magazine  tales 
were  very  well  paid,  the  play  in  London  had  brought 
him  in  something  like  a  hundred  pounds  a  week 
during  its  run  of  three  months,  and  would  in  all 
probability  do  as  well  through  the  autumn,  for  it 
was  running  again  after  its  August  closure.  The 
novelette,  which  had  started  with  such  promise, 

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would  produce  a  sum  by  no  means  to  be  despised, 
the  newer  tale  ought  to  do  much  more,  and  already 
had  brought  him  twenty-five  hundred  dollars  for  its 
serial  use.  Beyond  that  there  was  the  American 
production  of  "The  Walls  of  Destiny"  still  to  come. 
All  this,  he  thought,  should  put  him  at  least  on  an 
equality  as  regards  income  with  the  girl  he  was  to 
marry,  so  that  between  them  they  should  be  able 
to  live  very  decently  in  a  modest  fashion.  It  did 
not  mean  a  house  in  New  York,  of  course,  nor  even 
moderate  state  of  any  sort;  but  he  knew  Violet 
Winter  too  well  to  think  that  she  would  regret  the 
lack  of  these.  She  had  known  them  too  long  to 
value  them  unduly. 

So  he  tramped  his  floor  and  fought  out  these  new 
problems  until  the  fear  went  from  him  and  the 
way  seemed  free  of  obstacles.  In  the  evening  he 
dined  alone  and  went  to  one  of  the  theatres,  but 
the  play  failed  to  amuse  him  or  to  divert  him  from 
his  trend  of  thought;  so  he  went  out  and  walked 
a  long  way  in  the  night,  returning  home,  after  two 
or  three  hours,  fagged  and  very  sleepy. 


CHAPTER  XVI 

DAVID  was  changing  his  coat  shortly  before 
four  on  the  next  day,  in  preparation  for  his 
visit  to  Sixty-seventh  Street,  when  there  came  a 
knock  at  the  door.  He  slipped  into  the  jacket 
which  he  had  just  laid  off  and  went  to  see  who  was 
there.  It  was  a  messenger-boy  with  a  note,  and 
when  David  saw  the  hand  he  frowned  and  said : 

"Come  in  for  a  moment.  There  may  be  an 
answer." 

"Party  said  there  wasn't  no  answer,"  the  boy 
said,  but  he  came  inside  and  stood  waiting,  with 
his  cap  in  his  grimy  hands. 

"She's  still  ill,"  said  David  to  himself,  as  he 
ripped  open  the  envelope.  "Poor  dear!  She's 
still  ill."  He  was  dully  surprised  to  find  that  there 
were  three  sheets  of  paper — a  letter  rather  than  a 
note!  He  read  half-way  down  the  first  page  and 
halted.  His  eyes  rose  to  the  sharp,  wizened  face 
of  the  messenger  and  rested  there  for  several  long 
seconds. 

"There's  no  answer,"  he  said  at  last.  "You  can 
— go."  The  boy  lingered  until  David,  seeing  what 
he  wished,  tipped  him,  and  he  went  away,  closing 
the  door  after  him.  David  remained  where  he 


A    STUMBLING-BLOCK 

was,  staring  at  the  closed  door  as  he  had  stared  at 
the  boy's  ratlike  face — unseeing.  After  a  little  he 
crossed  the  room  to  the  writing-table  which  was 
there.  He  laid  the  written  sheets  down  and  looked 
about  for  a  pipe.  He  was  rather  a  long  time  find 
ing  it,  though  it  lay  in  plain  sight  under  his  eyes. 
He  filled  it  and  lighted  it  and  drew  it  into  a  full 
glow.  Then,  fortified  as  it  were,  he  once  more 
took  Violet  Winter's  letter  into  his  hands  and  read 
it  through. 

"I  lied  to  you  yesterday,  David,"  she  said.  "I  lied 
miserably.  I  had  no  headache  —  or,  at  least,  none  to 
speak  of.  I  was  afraid  to  see  you,  and  so  I  lied.  David, 
I  can't  go  on  with  it."  [This  is  where  David  had  sent 
the  messenger-boy  away  and  had  waited  to  light  his  faith 
ful  pipe.] 

"  It  would  be  madness  for  you  and  me  to  go  on  with  it. 
Somehow  I'm  sure  of  that.  We  were  a  little  mad  the 
other  night  when — when  we  changed  everything.  Oh, 
David,  I  am  afraid — and  I  have  a  very  honest  feeling  that 
my  fear  is  right,  that  it  is  given  me  for  a  sort  of  warning. 
I  think  it  would  be  fatal  for  you  to  marry  me,  fatal  to  you 
in  all  sorts  of  ways.  I  should  hamper  you  and  hang  upon 
you.  I'm  far  from  well,  you  know,  and  I  shall  never  be 
any  better,  I  suppose.  You  mustn't  have  a  millstone 
like  that  round  your  neck  at  the  very  outset  of  your  life. 

"Oh,  yes,  I  realize  that  I'm  putting  the  burden  of  it  all 
upon  you — that  I  seem  to  be  trying  for  the  appearance  of 
making  a  great  renunciation  for  your  sake.  Well,  partly 
it  -is  that,  but  I  don't  pretend  that  I'm  all  unselfish. 
Mostly  it  is  that  I'm  afraid — too  afraid  to  go  on  with  the 
thing.  You  see  I'm  quite  honest  with  you. 

"And,  David,  don't  think  that  I  have  been  playing  or 
flirting.  You  won't  think  that,  I  know.  I've  been  hon- 

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est  from  the  first — always  honest.  Give  me  that  small 
credit,  at  least.  Also,  don't  think  that  this  new  decision 
is  a  whim  or  a  jangle  of  nerves.  In  my  queer  fashion  I 
really  believe  I  am  trying  to  do  a  good  act.  Anyhow,  I 
must  do  it. 

"So  forgive  me  if  you  can,  my  dear,  but  in  any  case  be 
free  of  me.  You  need  freedom  more  than  you  need  me. 
And  I — I  expect  I'm  better  alone.  I  should  be  impossible 
to  get  on  with,  you  know. 

"Good-bye!  If  you  want  to,  come  and  see  me  in  a 
week  or  so — not  just  now.  I  should  like  to  think  that  we 
could  go  on  as  we  were  before.  Perhaps  you  wouldn't 
care  to,  however.  Don't  judge  me  too  harshly!  This  is 
costing  me  something,  you  know,  as  well  as  you. 

"I  have  read  this  over  and  it  is  a  very  incoherent 
scrawl,  but  I  cannot  make  it  better  now.  My  head  is 
tired.  And  you'll  understand. 

"VIOLET  WINTER." 

David  went  back  to  the  beginning  and  read  the 
letter  through  again  slowly  to  the  end.  His  pipe 
had  gone  out,  but  he  did  not  know.  After  a  time  he 
went  across  to  a  far  corner  of  the  room  where  there 
was  a  low,  broad  divan.  He  sat  down  rather  un 
comfortably  there  with  his  hands  clasped  between 
his  knees.  His  eyes  stared  unseeing  to  the  gray 
opposite  wall,  where  hung  a  Japanese  color-print 
by  Koriusai,  representing  the  Empress  Jingo  Kogu. 
The  three  sheets  of  .paper,  a  little  crumpled,  lay  at 
his  feet  on  the  floor. 

An  hour  went  by,  but  he  did  not  speak  or  stir 
— and  another  hour — and  a  third.  The  dusk  began 
to  gather  in  the  corners  of  the  room.  A  fourth 
hour  passed,  and  night  came  hard.upon  the  shadowy 

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dusk,  and  the  room  was  dark.  Then  David  rose 
quietly  and  went  into  his  sleeping-room.  His  feet 
struck  against  the  three  crumpled  papers  as  he 
moved,  but  he  paid  no  heed.  He  made  lights,  and 
proceeded  in  his  habitually  methodical  fashion  to 
change  into  dinner  -  clothes.  It  was  a  little  past 
eight  o'clock  when  he  left  the  house. 

He  turned  and  went  along  Seventeenth  Street 
to  Fifth  Avenue.  Then  he  turned  again,  and  pres 
ently  entered  a  certain  restaurant  which  had  been 
chiefly  patronized  by  quiet  and  well-to-do  French 
men  who  disliked  the  noise  and  glitter  of  a  newer 
place  and  the  louder  noise  and  cheaper  glitter  of 
an  older.  The  restaurant  was  now  out  of  vogue 
even  with  these  elect,  and  at  the  dinner-hour  com 
monly  presented  a  wellnigh  empty  desolation,  a 
hushed,  austere,  and  tarnished  ghost  of  ancient 
dignity,  wherein,  under  a  dim  and  churchly  light, 
white  tables  stood  un tenanted,  and  funereal  wait 
ers  whispered  sepulchrally  to  one  another  under 
the  faded  hangings  and  the  flaking  mirrors. 

David  slipped  into  a  remote  corner,  and  one  of 
the  mourners  took  his  hat  and  coat.  Across  the 
room  a  single  other  guest,  a  lean  Frenchman  with 
gray  hair  en  brosse  sat  behind  a  tall  glass  of  amer 
picon  and  the  day's  Courrier  des  Etats  Unis. 

A  waiter  came,  wrapped  in  melancholy,  and  bent 
over  David  with  the  grave  deference  of  a  curate  to 
his  bishop. 

"Monsieur  desire,  comme  aperitif?" 

"Un  Pernod,  Xavier,"  said  David — "un  Pernod 
177 


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au  sucre."  David's  usual  appetizer,  as  the  waiter 
knew,  was  a  mild  sherry-and-bitters ;  but  if  the 
man  felt  surprise  he  concealed  it.  He  brought  the 
absinthe  and  stood  by  while  David  prepared  it, 
pouring  out  an  extremely  liberal  portion.  Then  he 
went  away  to  order  the  soup,  and  the  little  ancho 
vies,  and  the  breast  of  mallard  duck  with  mush 
rooms,  and  the  artichoke,  and  the  half-bottle  of 
Gorton  of  '76. 

David  sat  glooming  over  his  opalescent  drink. 
His  mind  did  not  dwell  upon  Violet  Winter  nor  upon 
what  she  had  written  to  him.  He  had  put  the 
thought  of  her  quite  from  him  and  was  holding  it 
away  with  all  his  strength. 

He  had  the  same  blind  impulse  which  drives  the 
navvy  or  the  criminal  who  has  just  received  a 
"facer"  straight  to  the  nearest  bar  to  drink  him 
self  into  insensibility.  David  did  not  put  his  feel 
ing  quite  so  grimly  to  himself  as  that;  indeed,  he 
did  not  reflect  upon  it  at  all,  but  the  blind  impulse 
was  in  him,  as  in  the  humbler  man,  and  drove  him 
on — the  half -animal  instinct  to  deaden  thought,  to 
put  off  that  reckoning  with  grief  which  stood  white 
and  stern  in  the  shadows  waiting  for  him. 

He  had  believed  himself  hungry,  but  he  found 
that  he  could  not  eat.  The  soup  and  the  hors 
d'ceuvre  he  tasted  and  sent  away;  the  duck,  red, 
tender,  underdone,  stirred  him  to  a  sort  of  nausea, 
seemed  to  him  like  the  raw  flesh  a  beast  tears  at 
and  swallows.  But  he  drank  the  heavy  burgundy 
thirstily,  with  a  diminishing  sense  of  its  aromatic 

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richness.  He  was  amazed  and  angry,  after  a  little, 
to  find  that  the  flask  was  empty,  and  he  called  out 
to  the  mournful  waiter  in  a  tone  which  burst  so 
loud  and  peremptory  upon  that  hushed  place  that 
the  other  diner  across  the  room,  the  elderly  French 
man,  looked  up  over  the  top  of  his  paper  with  grave 
disapproval. 

The  melancholy  one  listened  to  David's  order 
of  another  half -bottle  of  the  Gorton,  '76,  with  dis 
creetly  raised  eyebrows,  but  he  slipped  away  with 
out  comment  to  fetch  it,  returned,  bearing  the 
dusty  bottle  with  tender  care,  opened  it,  presenting 
the  blackened  and  decayed  cork  for  inspection,  and 
retired  silently  to  his  shadows. 

David  drank  with  quick  sips,  and  the  merciful 
oblivion  which  had  been  drawing  about  him,  cloak 
ing  his  chill  soul  in  its  genial  folds,  drew  closer, 
warmer.  He  was  commonly  abstemious  in  the 
matter  of  all  drink,  shunning  spirits,  contenting 
himself  with  a  quaint,  old-fashioned,  and  apprecia 
tive  delight  in  good  wines  which  sat  oddly  upon 
his1  years  and  evoked  frequent  amusement  from  his 
whiskey-and-water  or  champagne  drinking  friends. 
In  consequence,  the  unaccustomed  glass  of  absinthe 
had  borne  him  well  out  upon  the  chosen  road,  as 
he  had  known  it  would  do,  and  the  quart  of  potent 
old  burgundy  had  carried  him  on.  He  was  not 
drunk,  for  his  thoughts  were  clear,  and  there  was 
no  excitement  in  him  but  rather  a  sumptuous  con 
tent  and  a  sense  of  comfortable  well-being.  Only, 
as  has  been  said,  oblivion  came  and  cloaked  him 

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from  all  assault.  Nothing  of  pain  or  woe  could 
touch  him  now. 

He  ordered  coffee  and  a  petit  verre  of  a  certain 
ancient  brandy  which  was  a  specialty  of  the  house. 
His  voice,  when  he  spoke  to  the  waiter,  was  clear 
and  low,  the  voice  of  an  entirely  sober  man;  and 
the  melancholy  one  regarded  him  with  a  chastened 
surprise  in  which  was  mingled  admiration. 

He  sat  long  over  his  coffee,  smoking  half  a  dozen 
cigarettes,  with  intervals  between,  leaning,  as  it 
were,  content  and  comfortable,  upon  the  bosom  of 
forgetfulness,  bathed  in  a  golden  haze  of  still  delight. 
It  was  past  eleven  when  he  paid  his  bill  and  rose  to 
go.  He  found  that  his  head  swam  perilously  when 
he  moved,  and  that  the  white  tables  and  the  faded 
splendor  of  the  old  walls  swung  to  and  fro  before 
him;  but  he  steadied  himself  with  an  effort  and 
went  out  into  the  street. 

The  cool  darkness  smote  him  in  the  face  like  a 
surge  of  water,  and  he  staggered  before  it  as  under 
the  weight  of  a  breaker  in  the  surf.  The  street 
lamps  swayed  gently  back  and  forth  in  a  very 
pleasant  manner,  but  David  frowned  at  them,  and 
they  stood  still,  seemingly  abashed.  He  started 
up  the  avenue,  and  became  aware  of  a  notable 
phenomenon — his  feet  moved  without  his  volition. 
They  did  not  wander  or  in  any  way  do  as  they 
should  not  do,  but  they  seemed  entirely  indepen 
dent.  He  was  as  one  without  sensation  from  the 
waist  downward. 

At  Seventeenth  Street  he  remembered  to  turn 
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east,  though  he  said  to  himself  that  it  did  not 
greatly  matter.  Then,  in  some  wonderful  fashion, 
the  vast,  gloomy  night  leaned  to  him,  swept  him 
up  to  itself  in  a  fold  of  its  mantle  and  bore  him 
onward.  Miraculously  he  covered  the  distance  to 
his  studio — or  was  borne  by  the  mothering  night. 
He  was  unconscious  of  space  or  effort  or  direction. 
.  Between  the  Fifth  Avenue  corner  and  his  own  door, 
which  he  unlocked  with  no  trouble  or  fumbling,  he 
knew  nothing.  He  closed  the  door  behind  him  and 
made  lights. 

But  presently,  when  he  had  sat  for  a  little  while 
idle — how  long  he  did  not  know — the  swimming 
of  his  dazed  head  began  again  and  became  more 
violent.  It  was  the  confined  air  of  the  room,  with 
its  faint  scent  of  tobacco, that  caused  this,  but  David 
did  not  realize  it.  He  scowled  at  the  swaying  gas 
lights,  but  this  time  they  would  not  be  still.  The 
slow,  heavy  intoxication  of  the  burgundy  was  be 
ginning  to  tell  upon  him.  He  tried  to  walk  about, 
but  found  that  he  staggered,  and  so  dropped  again 
into  his  seat. 

Then,  as  he  sat  there  and  cursed,  there  came  a 
low  knocking  at  the  door.  David  pulled  himself 
up,  rigid  and  still,  and  with  the  sudden  powerful 
effort  he  made  the  dizziness  retreated  from  him 
and  his  mind  began  to  clear.  Men  of  a  strong  con 
stitution,  unused  to  excessive  drink,  often  have  the 
power,  in  times  of  nervous  excitement,  momenta 
rily  to  throw  off  almost  altogether  the  effects  of 
intoxication,  though  the  effects  will  return  again 

181 


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with  redoubled  strength  once  the  nervous  strain  is 
over. 

David  got  to  his  feet  and  stood  with  his  back  to 
the  low,  old-fashioned  marble  mantel- piece.  He  said : 

"Come  in!"  and  then  said  it  over  again,  because 
the  first  time  he  had  managed  but  a  hoarse  whisper. 
Things  still  swam  before  him,  and  his  legs  were"  un 
certain,  but  he  was  sobering  fast. 

The  door  opened  slowly  and  closed  again. 

"Oh,  my  God!"  he  exclaimed.  He  put  up  a 
shaking  hand  over  his  eyes,  and  it  dropped  again 
beside  him,  strengthless. 

"I — had  to  come,  David!"  said  Miss  Winter. 
She  was  in  evening  dress,  without  a  hat,  wrapped 
in  a  white  opera-cloak.  She  leaned  back  against 
the  closed  door,  breathing  very  hard. 

"I  left  them  all  after — the  theatre,"  she  said. 
"They  were  going  on  to  Sherry's,  but  I  said  I  was — 
tired,  and  made  them  put  me  in  a  cab.  I  said  I 
was  going  home.  Then  I  came  here." 

She  wrung  her  hands  before  her. 

"I  can't  help  what  you  think!"  she  cried,  in  a 
half- whisper.  "I  can't  help  what  anybody  thinks! 
I  don't  care!  I  had  to  come!  „  David,  I  want  to 
come  back  to  you!  I've  got  to  come  back!  I 
thought  I  was  afraid,  and- — I  am,  but  I  can't  help 
it!  I  want  you  too  much!  I  can't  lose  you  now! 
Fear,  common-sense,  consideration  for  you,  unself 
ishness — they're  nothing!  I  find  they're  nothing 
at  all  to  me  when  I — look  forward  to  loneliness!  I 
can't  get  on  without  you,  that's  all  there's  of  it!" 

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David  stood  swaying  before  the  marble  mantel 
piece;  one  hand  reached  out  and  gripped  it  on 
either  side  to  hold  him  steady. 

"David!  David!"  cried  the  girl,  and  stretched 
out  her  arms  to  him.  "Take  me  back,  David!" 
she  cried,  with  the  beginnings  of  sobbing.  David 
did  not  stir,  and  she  came  across  the  room  to  him. 
At  closer  range  she  saw  his  face,  under  the  gaslight, 
White,  drawn,  haggard,  with  burning  eyes,  the  hair 
dishevelled  above  it,  and  she  gave  a  sudden  ex 
clamation  of  fear — "David!"  After  a  moment 
more  she  ran  to  him  and  caught  him  by  the  shoul 
ders  with  her  two  hands. 

"What  is  it?"  she  cried,  looking  up  to  him. 
"What  is  it,  David?"  She  was  no  child,  and  pres 
ently  she  knew  what  it  was.  She  broke  out  in  a 
sudden,  hysterical  little  fit  of  weeping  laughter. 

"Oh,  David,  you've  been  drinking!"  she  said; 
"you've  been  drinking!" 

"Yesh,"  said  David,  "I  know."  And  corrected 
it,  "Yes,  I  know." 

The  girl  hid  her  face,  shaking  still  with  her 
hysterical  fit  of  tears  and  laughter. 

"Oh,  did  I  drive  you  to  that?"  she  said.  "Did 
my  cruelty  do  that  to  you?  David,  I  seem  to 
bring  you  nothing  but  harm!" 

"Non-s-sense!"  said  David.  "Tha's — not  true! 
That's  not  true. ' '  He  took  a  step  towards  the  door, 
and  his  legs  obeyed  him  without  fault.  "You 
mustn'  stay  here!"  said  he.  "You  must  go  back. 
Some  one  might  come  in.  It's  not  s-safe." 


A    STUMBLING-BLOCK 

"I  know,"  she  said,  "I  know.  It's  dreadful.  I 
was  in  a  panic  every  moment  on  the  way.  And 
those  stairs!  Those  dreadful  stairs,  with  doors  at 
every  landing  where  people  might  have  come  out! 
Oh,  it's  dreadful,  if  you  like,  but  I  was  half  mad! 
I  had  to  come,  David.  I  should  have  died  if  I 
hadn't  come.  You  —  can't  understand.  I'll  go 
now,"  she  said.  "Don't  worry.  But  oh,  David, 
before  I  go,  forgive  me  and  take  me  back!  I  tell 
you  I  cannot  live  without  you.  I  can't  face  it!" 

"Yes,  yes!"  said  David,  swaying  on  his  feet. 
"Oh  yes!  I'll — come  to  you  to-morrow.  It's  all 
— right.  Only  go!  Please  go!"  His  arms  went 
out  towards  her,  but  he  drew  them  back  and  put 
them  behind  him.  "Please  go!"  he  said,  and  there 
was  something  oddly  pathetic  in  the  repetition. 

Miss  Winter  looked  at  him  with  shining  eyes. 

"Oh,  you're — good!  You're  good!"  she  cried. 
She  caught  at  one  of  the  hands  that  David  was 
setting  behind  him,  and  pressed  it  for  an  instant 
to  her  cheek,  then  she  crossed  quickly  to  the  door, 
and  David  followed. 

"No,  you  mustn't  come  down  with  me!"  she 
said.  "Let  me  go  alone!  I  shall  be  all  right, 
truly,  truly!"  For  a  moment  she  frowned  up  into 
his  face  with  anxious  eyes.  "You'll — you'll  be  all 
right  yourself,  David  ?"  she  said.  "You  don't  need 
any  one  to — you'll  be  all  right?"  He  knew  that 
she  was  trying  to  refer  to  his  state  without  men 
tioning  it  directly,  and  he  gave  her  a  little  tired 
smile.  He  wished  she  would  go,  for  the  strain  he 

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had  put  upon  himself  was  almost  at  the  breaking- 
point. 

"Oh  yes— quite!"  he  said.  "Good-night!  To 
morrow  I'll  come.  Please  go,  now!  To-morrow!" 
He  shut  the  door  behind  her  and  fell  against  it, 
clawing  with  his  hands  for  support.  Once  more 
the  world  wheeled  and  swam  before  him  in  a  sick 
chaos.  Clutching  at  the  panels  of  the  door,  he 
slipped  gently  down  till  he  was  on  the  floor,  half 
kneeling,  half  sitting,  and  he  hid  his  face  in  the 
bend  of  one  arm. 

There  was  no  joy  in  him  over  the  return  of  his 
world  to  its  good  orbit — the  salvation  of  his  happi 
ness.  He  did  not  realize  it  save  in  a  vague  and 
very  far-away  fashion.  He  had  no  world.  He  was 
slipping  away  from  it — a  sort  of  disembodied  and 
unhampered  spirit — moment  by  moment.  He  felt 
his  hold  upon  things  giving  away.  It  was  as  if 
cord  after  cord  which  bound  him  snapped  one  by 
one.  Then  at  last  the  final  cord  parted,  and  he 
drifted  out  into  the  thronged  space  between  worlds 
where  was  an  infinite  void  of  darkness,  star-spat 
tered,  lit  by  strange  and  uncouth  flames. 

Much  later,  after .  an  unmeasurable  interval  of 
time,  he  was  dimly  conscious  of  activity.  Some 
power  not  within  him,  some  stern  determination 
whose  import  he  could  not,  in  the  ruin  and  whirl 
of  things,  grasp  or  comprehend,  was  at  work  with 
him.  His  mind,  feebly,  from  a  great,  great  dis 
tance,  realized  that  his  body  was  making  a  feverish, 
desperate  search  for  something  of  which  he  had 
13  185 


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pressing  need.  He  knew  that  he  was  fumbling  in 
drawers  and  closets  and  cabinets,  in  boxes  and 
long-undisturbed  trunks. 

At  last  he  seemed  to  have  found  the  treasure, 
whatever  it  might  be,  and  was  at  rest.  Following 
that  he  was  half  conscious  of  getting  off  his  clothes, 
or  most  of  them,  of  putting  out  the  gaslights — he 
blew  them  out,  and  was  angry  because  it  was  so 
difficult — and  of  lying  down  upon  his  bed. 

Followed  another  interval  of  time — immeasurable 
also.  At  first  it  passed  in  a  heavy  stupor,  but  pres 
ently,  awaking  from  this,  he  was  aware  of  keen 
anguish  and  of  peril.  That  void  of  darkness  where 
he  dwelt  between  worlds  was  become  a  chaos  of 
flamelike  horrors,  incorporate,  monstrous,  and 
terrible,  who  screamed  at  him  and  clutched  his 
throat,  the  while  some  made  fast  a  band  of  white- 
hot  iron  round  his  head  just  over  the  eyes.  They 
held  his  mouth  so  that  he  could  not  breathe,  or 
thrust  soft  balls  of  cotton  into  it,  and  ever  they 
screamed  at  him.  Behind  them  loomed  a  greater 
horror  which  he  could  not  see,  but  whose  nearing 
presence  he  felt.  He  was  cold  and  aching  all  over, 
because  in  a  little  while  the  greater  horror  would 
close  upon  him  and  he  be  lost.  He  tried  to  scream, 
but  the  devils  held  his  mouth,  and  twisted  tighter 
and  tighter  that  band  of  white-hot  iron  about  his 
head.  Presently  he  knew  that  the  band  must 
accomplish  its  end  and  his  head  burst,  but  he  did 
not  care,  for  flesh  was  coming  to  its  utmost  limit  of 
suffering,  and  the  merciful  stupor  was  creeping  upon 

186 


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him  once  more.  There  remained  only  icy  and 
shivering  fear  of  that  thing  which  was  shortly  to 
obliterate  him. 

Then,  very  suddenly,  out  of  the  gloom  a  voice 
called,  and  David's  racked  body  stiffened  and  his 
eyes  snapped  open. 

"Davie!  Davie!"  the  voice  said,  and  across  the 
flame-flecked  space  she  came  to  him — Rosemary, 
slim,  white,  sweet-eyed,  virginal,  her  arms  out 
stretched. 

"Come,  Davie!"  called  Rosemary,  and  her  beau 
tiful  face  was  drawn  and  anxious.  "Oh,  come, 
come!" 

David  tried  to  rise  from  his  bed,  but  all  the  devils 
screamed  at  once  and  threw  themselves  upon  him, 
holding  his  throat  and  his  mouth,  twisting  the 
white-hot  band  tighter  about  his  head.  He  strug 
gled  with  them,  blind,  covered  with  a  cold  sweat, 
but  dropped  back  again  gasping. 

"Come,  Davie!"  the  girl  called,  and  her  voice  rose 
to  a  sharp  cry.  "Oh,  come  quickly,  quickly,  before 
it  is  too  late!" 

"I  cannot  come!"  groaned  David,  held  prostrate 
under  the  flaming  devils. 

' '  You  must ! ' '  she  said.     "Oh,  Davie,  come ! ' ' 

All  the  strength  and  the  will  in  him  rose  to  the 
call.  He  gave  a  great  plunging  leap  and  was  out 
upon  his  feet,  but  the  greater  horror,  who  had 
waited  beyond,  smote  him  in  the  face  and  he  fell 
to  the  floor  prostrate. 

Rosemary  had  moved  a  little  away,   but  she 
187 


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stretched  her  beautiful  arms  back  to  him,  and  her 
face  was  almost  contorted  with  anxious  appeal. 

"Come!  Come!  Come!"  she  cried;  and  David 
writhed  towards  her  over  the  floor,  crawling  like 
a  snake.  The  sweat  dropped  from  his  face  as  he 
went,  and  sometimes  his  head  fell  and  struck 
heavily  upon  the  naked  boards,  but  the  pain  of  the 
blow  revived  him  and  he  crept  on.  A  last  little 
gust  of  strength  waked  in  his  body,  and  he  rose  to 
his  knees,  swaying,  got  somehow  to  his  feet.  His 
groping  hands  touched  a  window,  closed  save  at 
the  top.  Rosemary  had  gone  beyond.  She  stood 
outside,  slim,  white,  sweet-eyed,  virginal,  her  arms 
beckoning  him. 

He  gave  a  great  cry — "  Rose-Marie !  Rose-Marie !" 
The  flame-flecked  darkness  rushed  over  him,  and  he 
pitched  forward,  his  arms  across  his  face,  crashed 
through  the  broad  lower  pane  of  the  window,  and 
lay  still,  his  legs  within  the  room,  his  head  and  arms 
and  shoulders  prone  upon  the  iron  platform  of  the 
fire-escape  which  was  reared  against  the  back  wall 
of  the  building. 

He  came  to  his  senses  with  the  gray  dawn,  sick, 
dizzy,  and  aching  from  head  to  foot.  His  hands 
were  cut  and  had  been  bleeding;  blood  was  caked 
upon  them.  One  cheek  had  been  cut,  too,  and  a 
shoulder  bruised  in  the  fall.  When  he  stirred  his 
head,  the  dull  ache  in  it  wakened  into  something 
wellnigh  intolerable. 

He  lay  bewildered,  thinking  himself  in  a  horrible 
dream.  Through  the  iron  strips  of  the  platform 

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under  his  arms  he  stared  down  into  the  area  far 
below,  with  its  clothes-lines  and  ash-cans,  and 
wondered  what  it  was.  It  was  a  long  time  before 
memory  and  realization  came  to  him. 

At  last,  when  he  knew,  he  made  his  way  with 
caution  back  through  the  broken  window.  The 
reek  of  escaping  gas  smote  him  in  the  face  and 
nearly  drove  him  back ;  but  after  a  little  he  rushed 
at  the  two  bracket-lights  which  had  been  left  on 
and  closed  them,  and,  after  a  panting,  giddy  in 
terval,  succeeded  in  opening  all  the  windows  of 
the  place  and  the  (  doors  into  the  corridor.  It 
was  a  blustering  morning,  and  in  a  few  minutes 
the  rooms  were  swept  free  of  odor.  David,  weak 
and  shaking,  sank  down  into  a  chair  and  took  his 
head  into  his  hands.  Something  dangled  from  one 
wrist,  and  he  looked  dully  to  see  what  it  was.  It 
was  a  long  thong  of  soft  leather  with  a  little  leathern 
pocket  fastened  to  the  thong.  He  had  once  worn 
it  about  his  neck  for  nearly  two  years,  but  he  had 
not  seen  it  or  thought  of  it  since  the  end  of  that 
time. 

He  opened  the  little  leathern  pouch  with  fingers 
that  shook  and  twitched.  Within  there  was  a  dry 
and  crumbling  spray  of  yellowed  leaves,  very  sweet 
and  aromatic.- 

"Rosemary,  Da  vie!    That's  for  remembrance." 


CHAPTER   XVII 

ROBERT  HENLEY  made  his  promised  visit 
to  New  York  in  October.  As  before,  he  did 
not  tell  David  when  to  expect  him,  save  very 
vaguely,  but  appeared  unannounced  one  afternoon 
at  the  studio  in  East  Seventeenth  Street. 

It  seemed  to  David  that  in  spite  of  an  almost 
comic  smartness  of  attire  the  old  gentleman  showed 
his  age  more  plainly  than  ever  before;  that  in  the 
past  eighteen  months  he  had  grown  much  older 
than  the  time  should  warrant;  that  his  face  was 
thinner  and  whiter,  and  that  his  hand  had  lost  its 
strength  of  grip.  But  if  these  things  were  true  it 
was  also  true  that  the  old  spirit  burned  as  fiercely 
as  ever,  and,  upon  occasion,  lent  as  martial  a 
gleam  to  Robert's  pale,  protruding  eye.  Physical 
weakness  could  never  quench  that  inner  fire.  It, 
seemingly,  was  eternal. 

The  old  gentleman  was  in  the  best  of  good  spirits. 
He  chuckled  and  strutted  over  David's  latter  suc 
cesses  as  if  he  had  managed  them  all  himself. 

"Eh!  I  told  you  so,  lad!"  he  said,  a  score  of 
times,  wagging  his  gray  head  wisely.  "  I  told  you 
so,  long  ago.  I  foretold  it  all.  Didn't  I  ?  Didn't 
I,  eh?  I  said  you'd  do  great  things  if  you'd  keep 

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yourself  free  from  entanglements  and  responsi 
bilities.  An  artist  has  got  responsibilities  enough 
to  himself  and  to  the  world  without  adding  a  fam 
ily  of  'em,  eh?  Yes,  by  gad!  I  made  you  stay 
free  and  untrammelled,  and  now,"  said  old  Robert, 
with  the  open  gesture  of  a  showman — "  now  look 
at  the  result!  You're  on  your  way  to  the  very  top 
— the  top,  by  gad,  sir!  There's  no  other  young 
writer-man  in  this  country  with  such  a  claim  on 
the  future  as  you  have  now — not  one.  A  gentle 
man  whose  opinion  I  value  very  highly,  sir,  wrote 
that  to  me  a  week  ago.  These  were  his  very  words. ' ' 

David  laughed  and  reddened. 

"Oh,  come,  Uncle  Robert!"  said  he.  "That's 
laying  it  on  a  bit  thick,  you  know.  I  can't  agree 
to  all  that." 

"Who  asked  you  to  agree,  sir?"  said  the  old 
gentleman,  testily.  "/  didn't.  I  ask  you  to  do 
no  more  than  go  on  as  you  have  been  going.  Never 
you  mind  how  good  or  bad  your  work  is.  The 
world  '11  settle  that.  And  I  think  I  know  which 
way  it  11  settle  it,  too.  Just  you  go  on  working, 
David!  That's  all." 

He  broke  off  to  turn  his  peering  frown  upon  the 
younger  man's  face,  as  David  stood  before  him 
filling  a  pipe  under  the  light  of  the  broad  north 
windows. 

"But  not  too  hard,  lad!"  he  said,  presently,  in 
another  tone .  ' '  You ' ve  been  sticking  to  it  too  closely. 
You  look  done  up.  Mustn't  try  to  do  without  rest. " 

And,  indeed,  David  at  this  time  did  look  "done 
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up."  That  night,  a  fortnight  before,  in  which  his 
life  had  been  saved  by  a  miracle,  had  shaken  him 
sorely.  Rosemary,  risen  out  of  a  buried  past — 
Rosemary,  slim,  white,  virginal,  with  love  in  her 
sweet  eyes,  come  to  rescue  him  from  a  horrible 
death,  abode  with  him  hauntingly;  not  in  a  visual 
realness,  as  in  that  wellnigh  fatal  hour,  but  as 
something  seen  by  the  mind's  eye — and  the  mem 
ory's.  In  a  keener,  more  poignant  fashion  she 
wrought  in  him  during  these  days,  as  she  had  done 
once  before  with  that  first  letter  of  hers  after  the 
long  silence  between  them.  The  same  bitter-sweet 
turmoil  surged  in  him  now,  made  infinitely  more 
bitter  by  the  sense  of  disloyalty  to  Violet  Winter 
which  it  waked,  until  at  last,  as  in  that  other  in 
stance,  he  was  forced  to  put  forth  all  his  strength 
in  a  mighty  effort,  and  so  drive  her  from  his 
thoughts.  Was  Rosemary  not  dead  to  him  and  he 
bound  to  another  ? 

They  fell  into  talk  of  Croydon,  and  old  Robert 
had  another  death  or  two  to  report,  alas!  The 
old  guard  was  falling  fast  now,  and  Robert,  though 
for  twenty  years  he  had  walked  catlike  and  alone, 
seemed  a  little  depressed  over  it.  After  all,  these 
good  souls  had  been  the  friends  of  his  youth,  and 
one  does  not  quite  steel  one's  self  towards  such. 

A  pause  came,  and  David,  flushing  a  very  little, 
asked  about  Rosemary  Crewe,  for  this  much  he 
was  determined  to  allow  himself.  She  should  not 
haunt  him  but  he  must  know  sometimes  of  her 
faring.  He  asked  if  she  had  married. 

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Old  Robert's  eyes  dropped  and  he  twisted  a  bit 
uneasily  in  his  chair.  The  subject  was  a  tender 
one,  for  he  had  not  forgotten  those  evasions  of  his 
— or  were  they  lies  ?  They  hurt  him  now  and  then 
when  he  thought  of  them;  but  old  Robert  seldom 
retreated. 

"I — have  not  heard,"  he  said,  slowly.  "No,  I 
suppose  she  is  not  married.  I  suppose  I  should 
have  known  of  it  if  she  were.  It  must  have  been — 
postponed,  I  should  think.  Yes,  postponed.  Hiram 
Crewe  is  far  from  well,  and  the  young  lady  is  doubt 
less  busy  with  nursing  him."  He  stole  a  swift, 
shamed  look  at  David,  whose  present  state  of  mind 
towards  this  ancient  affair  doubtless  he  burned  to 
ascertain,  but  David  was  looking  away.  His  face 
showed  no  great  interest,  and  it  may  be  that 
old  Robert  took  to  himself  some  comfort  from 
that. 

So  then  a  little  silence  fell  between  them,  and  for 
a  few  moments  neither  of  the  two  spoke,  Robert 
Henley  sullen  over  the  lie  he  had  had  to  repeat, 
and  David  busy  with  his  memories.  But  at  last 
the  younger  man  roused  himself  with  a  little  sigh 
and  shook  off  his  mood. 

"What  time  is  it?"  he  said,  and  pulled  out  his 
watch.  "  Nearly  five!  Would  you  care  to  make  a 
call  with  me,  Uncle  Robert  ?  I  should  like  to  have 
you  meet  some  friends  of  mine  who  have  been  very 
good  to  me — the  Harry  Farings.  They  live  not  so 
very  far  from  here.  I  have  talked  to  them  so  much 
about  you  that  they  made  me  promise  I  would 


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bring  you  up  the  next  time  you  were  in  town.  I 
think  you'd  like  them.  Would  you  care  to  go  ?" 

Old  Robert,  after  some  hesitation,  said  that  he 
would  go.  "  Though,  mind  you,  David,"  he  warned, 
"  it  is  a  long  time  that  I  have  been  out  of  the  world. 
I  have  very  small  store  of  social  graces.  I  shall 
seem  a  savage  curmudgeon  to  ladies."  But  David 
laughed  at  him  and  went  into  the  other  room  to 
change  his  clothes,  for  he  was  in  working  togs. 

"You  have  so  much  better  manners  than  any 
one  has  nowadays,"  he  said,  "that  you  make  all 
the  rest  of  us  look  like  curmudgeons,  Uncle  Robert. 
I'm  worrying  over  our  manners,  not  yours." 

They  found  a  hansom  at  the  corner  of  Third 
Avenue  and  drove  up  to  Thirty-sixth  Street. 
Beatrix  Faring  was  alone  when  they  arrived,  and 
she  welcomed  Robert  Henley  very  sweetly.  No 
man — or  woman,  either — was  ever  able  to  resist 
Mrs.  Paring's  charm,  and  she  soon  had  old  Robert 
beaming  with  pleasure  and  paying  her  ponderous, 
old-fashioned  compliments  in  his  very  best  fashion. 
Several  other  people  came  in,  but  as  they  were  all 
intimate  friends  and  quite  able  to  shift  for  them 
selves,  she  left  them  to  their  own  devices  and  de 
voted  herself  entirely  to  David's  guest. 

She  was  asking  him  if  he  could  not  spare  them 
an  evening  later  in  the  week  for  dinner,  when  she 
saw  the  old  gentleman  stiffen  suddenly  in  his  chair 
and  put  up  the  glass  which  had  dropped  from  his 
eyes. 

"  May  I  ask,  ma'am,  who  the  young  lady  is  who 
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has  just  entered?"  he  demanded.  "I  have  seen 
her  before,  I  think." 

Mrs.  Faring  turned  to  look.  "Oh,  that  is  Miss 
Winter,"  she  said.  "Violet  Winter.  She's  very, 
very  clever — so  clever  that  I'm  rather  afraid  of 
her,  though  I'm  exceedingly  fond  of  her,  too. 
And  she's  as  popular  as  she  is  clever,  both  here 
and  in  Europe.  Every  one  knows  her."  She 
smiled  and  nodded  across  the  room  to  the  girl, 
and  Miss  Winter,  seeing  that  her  hostess  was  ab 
sorbed  with  an  elderly  stranger,  nodded  back  and 
turned  to  speak  to  David  Rivers,  who  had  at  once 
gone  to  her. 

Robert  Henley  watched  the  two  greet  each  other 
and  move  a  little  apart,  away  from  the  other  peo 
ple,  and  his  face  took  on  an  odd,  bleak  look.  Pres 
ently  he  turned  once  more  to  Mrs.  Faring. 

"I  am  about  to  ask  you  a  question,  ma'am," 
said  he,  "  which  I  have  no  right  to  ask.  You  will 
think  me  an  exceedingly  rude  old  man,  which, 
doubtless,  I  am,  but  I  do  not  ask  lightly.  What " — 
he  nodded  towards  the  two  young  people  across  the 
room — "what  sort  of  an  intimacy  exists  between 
David  and  this  young  lady — this  Miss  Winter? 
How  much  does  he  see  of  her?"  He  saw  Beatrix 
Faring's  eyes  widen  and  he  held  up  his  hand.  "I 
repeat,"  said  he,  "that  I  do  not  ask  lightly.  I  beg 
you  to — pardon  my  rudeness.  I — have  but  one 
interest  left  in  my  life,  and  that  is  his  welfare — 
David's  welfare.  You  are  his  friend  and  you  can 
tell  me  something  that  it  is  important  for  me  to 


A   STUMBLING-BLOCK 

know."  Old  Robert's  face  twisted  suddenly  and 
he  bent  one  hand  fiercely  upon  his  knee.  "  I  saved 
him  once,"  he  said — "once,  long  ago,  at  some  cost 
to — several  people.  I  will  not  have  him  entangled. 
I  will  not  have  him  marry  or  contemplate  marriage. 
It  would  ruin  his  career." 

Beatrix  Faring  nodded  gravely,  looking  into  the 
old  gentleman's  face. 

"I  see  how  deeply  you  feel,  Mr.  Henley,"  said 
she.  "  I  understand — quite.  Perhaps  I  agree  with 
you,  in  a  way.  I'm  very  fond  of  David,  too,  you 
know.  It  would  hurt  me  very  much  to  see  any 
harm  come  to  him.  I  have  wondered  sometimes 
about  his  marrying.  There  is  a  marriage,  you 
know,  Mr.  Henley,  that  could  lift  David  to  the 
skies  instead  of  hanging  a  millstone  round  his  neck. 
Somewhere  there's  some  woman  who  is  all  sweet 
ness  and  kindness  and  self-sacrifice  and  understand 
ing — a  woman  who  would  make  the  flame  in  David 
burn  brighter  and  higher,  spur  him  to  the  utmost 
that's  in  him  now,  and  make  his  life  so  beautiful 
that  what  he  is  now  would  be  only  a  petty  little 
beginning.  I  think  there's  such  a  woman  for  every 
man,  but  the  two  don't  often  meet,  do  they?  I 
wonder  if  David  has  ever  met  the  woman  God 
meant  for  him?" 

Old  Robert's  face  twisted  again  and  he  looked 
away.  For  some  odd  reason  Rosemary  Crewe's 
eyes  had  suddenly  come  before  him. 

"As  to  Violet  Winter,"  pursued  Mrs.  Faring,  "I 
really  can  tell  you  very  little.  They  know  each 

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other  well,  she  and  David.  I  know  that  much. 
She  admires  him  and  believes  in  him,  and  they  see 
each  other  frequently.  That  is  all  I  know.  I  am 
sure  that  they're  not  engaged  or  anything  like  that. 
I  should  have  heard  of  it  among  the  first  if  it  were 
so,  because  I  know  them  both  so  well." 

She  was  quite  honest  in  this.  She  did  not  know 
of  the  engagement.  It  had  been  Miss  Winter's 
whim  to  keep  it  entirely  secret  up  to  this  time. 

Old  Robert  Henley  bowed. 

"I  thank  you,  ma'am,"  said  he.  "You  have 
met  my  ill  manners  with  very  great  courtesy.  I 
envy  David  your  friendship.  He  is  exceedingly 
fortunate.  I  could  desire  nothing  better  for  him 
than  to  rest  content  in  that  and  avoid — any  other 
alliances."  He  looked  once  more  across  the  room 
to  where  David  stood  talking  to  Violet  Winter, 
and  David,  looking  up  just  then,  nodded  and  came 
over  to  the  two.  Old  Robert  rose. 

"  We  must  be  going,  I  think,"  said  he.  He  bowed 
with  great  ceremony  over  Beatrix  Paring's  hand, 
and,  when  she  repeated  her  invitation,  said  that  to 
dine  with  them  would  be  an  honor  which  he  should 
long  cherish.  And  so  the  two  men  went  away. 

They  drove  back  to  Seventeenth  Street  almost 
in  complete  silence.  Robert  Henley  seemed  pre 
occupied  and  disinclined  to  talk,  and  David  was  a 
little  out  of  temper  because  Violet,  in  a  sudden 
access  of  something  which  she  protested  was  fear, 
had  refused  to  have  Mr.  Henley  presented  to  her. 

"He'd  hate  me,  David,"  she  said.  "I  know. 
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I'm  quite  sure  of  it.  He  wouldn't  approve  of  me 
at  all,  and  that  would  annoy  you.  Let  it  alone! 
There's  really  no  reason  why  we  must  know  each 
other."  David  argued  that  there  were  excellent 
reasons  why  the  two  should  know  each  other,  but 
Miss  Winter  was  nervously  stubborn  about  it,  and 
he  had  to  give  over. 

He  asked  old  Robert,  as  the  cab  turned  south 
into  Fourth  Avenue  from  Twenty-third  Street,  if 
he  should  drop  him  at  his  hotel,  but  Robert  said 
he  would  come  up  to  the  studio  for  a  few  moments 
since  it  was  still  early,  not  quite  six  o'clock. 

He  laid  off  his  hat  when  they  had  arrived  there, 
and  walked  up  and  down  the  long  room  with  his 
hands  behind  him.  The  attitude  put  David  in 
mind  of  those  old  Croydon  days,  when,  once  a  week, 
the  old  gentleman's  hands  were  under  his  coat-tail 
as  he  traversed  Main  Street  between  his  home  and 
the  Eagle  Hotel.  He  wondered  if  the  habit  was 
still  maintained. 

Old  Robert  turned  and  faced  him. 

"The  young  lady,  David,"  said  he — "the  young 
lady  with  whom  you  were  talking!  She  was  the 
same  we  saw  in  a  restaurant  on  my  last  visit  here?" 

"Oh  yes!"  said  David.  "I  remember.  Yes,  it 
was  the  same.  She  is  Miss  Violet  Winter.  I  know 
her  very  well,  and  admire  her  greatly." 
'  "How  greatly?"  demanded  old  Robert,  and  the 
fire  began  to  waken  in  those  pale  eyes  of  his. 
David  gave  an  embarrassed  little  laugh. 

"Well,  it's  rather  difficult  to  express  a  measure 
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for  that  sort  of  thing,  isn't  it  ?"  said  he.  "  I  admire 
Miss  Winter  very  much.  She's  kind  enough  to 
take  an  interest  in — in  my  work,  and  all  that. 
And  we're  congenial." 

"Leave  her  alone,  David,"  said  the  old  man. 
"I  told  you  once  before  that  she  and  her  kind  are 
vampires;  and  I  tell  you  so  again.  She'll  cripple 
you,  she'll  entangle  you,  she'll  rob  you  of  your 
youth  and  strength,  your  enthusiasm  and  your 
ambition;  and  she'll  give  you  nothing  in  return. 
She's  a  vampire,  and  you  bid  fair  to  prove  a  fool." 
David  flushed  red. 

"Come,  Uncle  Robert!"  said  he.  "You — you 
mustn't  say  that,  you  know.  I  couldn't  take  that 
from  anybody  in  the  world,  not  even  you.  I  don't 
mind  your  calling  me  a  fool — that's  nothing.  But 
you  mustn't  say  that  sort  of  thing  of  Miss  Winter. 
She's  a  very  dear  friend  of  mine,  and  she —  Well, 
one  doesn't  say  such  things  of  a  woman — a  lady." 

"  David,"  said  old  Robert  Henley,  "  I  do  not  wish 
to  be  discourteous,  but  I  feel  very  strongly — more 
strongly  than  you  know.  This  thing  is  important 
to  me.  I  want  you  to  make  me  a  promise,  for  both 
your  sake  and  mine — we-  will  put  it,  if  you  like,  for 
my  sake — to  keep  away  from  this  lady,  to  see  no 
more  of  her." 

"That  I  can't  do,  Uncle  Robert,"  said  David. 

The  old  man  drew  a  short  breath  which  was 
something  like  a  sob. 

"My  God,  boy!"  said  he.  "Do  I  deserve  noth 
ing  of  you  ?  I  demand  this  promise !  I  demand  it !" 

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"I  am  engaged  to  be  married  to  Miss  Winter," 
said  David. 

Old  Robert  sat  down  in  a  near-by  chair  and  bent 
his  head.  Presently  he  began  to  shake  like  a  man 
with  a  chill,  and  his  white,  clawlike  hands  slipped 
from  his  knees  and  hung  beside  him.  His  face  was 
in  shadow  so  that  David  could  not  see  it. 

So  he  sat  for  a  little  time,  huddled  in  the  chair, 
not  speaking,  and  David  did  not  speak  either,  for 
he  was  angry.  But  after  a  time  the  old  man  rose 
to  his  feet,  swaying.  He  turned  to  the  table  be 
yond,  where  he  had  laid  his  hat  and  stick,  and  took 
them  up.  Then,  without  looking  at  David,  he 
crossed  the  room  to  the  door.  He  walked  feebly, 
bent  at  the  shoulders.  He  opened  the  door  and 
stood  a  moment,  holding  it. 

"I'm — done  with  you,"  he  said,  without  turning. 
"I'm  done  with  you,"  and  went  out,  closing  the 
door  after  him. 

David  gave  a  great  cry. 

"No,  no,  no!"  He  sprang  to  the  door  and  out 
upon  the  landing,  calling  down  into  the  half -gloom 
of  the  stairway. 

' '  Uncle  Robert !  Uncle  Robert ! "  He  heard  the 
descending  feet  and  old  Robert's  heavy  breathing, 
but  no  answer  came.  He  called  again  and  again, 
but  there  was  only  that  slow,  steady  shuffle  of  de 
scending  feet,  then,  after  a  time,  the  sound  of  the 
front  door  closing. 

David  went  back  into  the  studio  alone. 


CHAPTER  XVIII 

THEY  were  married  in  November.  David  had 
expected  and,  with  a  man's  dread  of  such 
matters,  feared  that  Violet  would  insist  upon  a 
ceremonious  wedding,  with  much  pomp  and  state, 
but  when  he  found  that  she  wished  the  affair  to  be 
as  quiet  as  possible  and  without  any  state  at  all, 
he  persuaded  her  to  " have  it  over"  almost  at  once. 
The  phrase  was  his,  and  Violet  laughed  at  it,  saying : 

"Poor  dear,  you're  panic-stricken,  aren't  you, 
for  fear  I'll  change  my  mind  and  have  a  church 
full.  Well,  you  needn't  be.  I  don't  want  a  church 
full  at  all.  I  should  very  much  like  just  to  go  to 
that  place-around-the-corner,  or  whatever  they  call 
it,  and  be  married  with  the  sexton  and  a  newsboy 
for  witnesses,  like  the  people  who  run  away." 

So  she  gave  in  to  him  readily  enough,  and,  though 
the  wedding  was  not  at  the  Little-Church-Round- 
the-Corner,  with  a  sexton  and  a  newsboy  for  wit 
nesses,  it  was  almost  as  unceremonious,  for  there 
were  not  above  a  dozen  people  present.  Mrs. 
Hawtrey  lent  a  wintry  and  sardonic  smile  to  the 
occasion,  and  a  certain  great-uncle  of  Violet's,  a 
depressed  and  lachrymose  gentleman  from  some 
where  in  the  South,  had  been  imported  to  give  the 
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bride  away.  Also  the  Farings  were  there,  and  John 
Cowper.  David  had  been  genuinely  touched  by  the 
old  gentleman's  voluntary  offer  to  stand  beside  him. 

From  Robert  Henley  there  had  come  not  even  a 
word  of  congratulation,  not  a  reply  to  the  letter 
David  had  sent  pleading  for  a  return  to  their  old  re 
lations.  Old  Robert  had  left  New  York  on  the  morn 
ing  after  that  brief,  stormy  scene  in  Seventeenth 
Street,  and  he  had  refused  to  see  David  or  to  hold 
communication  of  any  sort  with  him  prior  to  his 
departure.  A  quarterly  instalment  of  income  from 
that  mythical  fortune  had  fallen  due  shortly  after 
this,  and  old  Robert  had  forwarded  the  money 
without  comment  or  remark,  requesting  in  formal 
fashion  an  acknowledgment  of  its  receipt,  but 
when  David,  in  lieu  of  acknowledgment,  had  writ 
ten  a  long  letter,  he  would  not  answer  it.  It  seemed 
that  he  wished  the  break  to  be  absolute,  but — if 
David  had  known — there  must,  after  all,  have  been 
one  deep  well  of  softness  in  the  grim  old  heart,  else 
he  had  made  plain  the  long  deception  in  the  matter 
of  money  and  so  humiliated  the  lad  forever. 

The  Farings  lent  the  bride  and  groom  a  little 
country  place  of  theirs  in  Connecticut,  on  the  shore 
of  the  Sound,  for  the  honeymoon — a  comfortable 
brick  cottage  set  deep  in  from  the  high-road  at  the 
end  of  a  long,  private  lane,  and  surrounded  by  a 
very  beautiful  garden  wherefrom  one  looked  upon 
the  sea ;  and  the  two,  after  the  wedding  breakfast, 
motored  out  from  town,  the  luggage  having  been 
sent  on  in  advance. 

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It  was  not  a  very  joyous  ride,  though  the  day 
was  fine.  Violet  looked  white  and  rather  ill,  and 
David  himself  was  in  no  mood  for  gayety.  He 
had  felt  curiously  alone,  deserted,  at  the  wedding. 
Old  Robert's  defection  had  hurt  him  more  than  he 
could  have  told.  To  be  sure  Violet  had  had  no 
flock  of  tearfully  affectionate  relations  to  hang  upon 
her  and  so  make  the  contrast  more  marked,  but, 
after  all,  there  had  been  the  aunt  and  the  strange 
great-uncle  and  a  half-dozen  friends  of  old  intimacy. 
Upon  David's  side  there  had  been,  in  addition  to 
the  Farings,  only  John  Cowper,  and  David  knew 
too  well  that  this  kindly  old  gentleman  was  present 
only  out  of  courtesy.  There  had  been  no  one  of 
his  own  to  stand  with  him,  and  he  felt  lonely. 

So  they  were  both  rather  silent  while  the  great 
car  bore  them  swiftly  up  Fifth  Avenue  and  across 
the  Park  and  out  upon  the  Riverside  Drive.  But 
as  they  came  beyond  the  city's  streets,  and,  passing 
over  a  bridge,  reached  the  open  country  road, 
David  shook  off  his  brooding  humor  and  turned  to 
pull  the  furs  more  closely  round  the  woman  who 
sat  beside  him.  Her  eyes  were  closed,  but  she 
opened  them  and  gave  him  a  little  faint  smile. 

"I'm  all  right,  thanks,"  she  said.  "Quite  warm 
and  comfortable.  The  jolting  hurt  my  head  a 
very  little,  but  it's  better  now  on  this  road." 

"You  look  tired,"  said  David — "fagged  out.  I 
wish  we'd  gone  by  train  instead  of  this.  This 
motoring  out  was  a  fool  idea  of  Harry  Faring's. 
I  might  have  known  better." 

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"No,"  said  she,  "it  was  my  own  idea,  really.  I 
asked  Harry  if  we  couldn't  motor  instead  of  going 
by  train.  I  thought  the  air  would  be  good — and  it 
is.  Truly,  I'm  not  tired,  not  in  the  least."  She 
put  out  one  hand  to  his. 

"  I  was  only  thinking,  David,"  she  said.  "  And  I 
expect  you  were,  too.  It's  a — it's  rather  a  solemn 
thing,  you  know,  this  getting  married.  It's  such 
a  frightfully  permanent  thing  —  so  terrifyingly 
permanent.  I'm  not  sure  that  I'm  not  a  little 
frightened." 

David  laughed. 

"  It's  a  bit  early  to  be  sorry  you've  done  it,"  said 
he.  "  But  there's  always  a  divorce  to  be  had,  you 
know.  Do  you  want  to  get  rid  of  me  ?  We'll  stop 
at  Yonkers  and  ask  them  for  a  divorce." 

But  the  woman  shivered,  and  would  not  smile  in 
answer  to  him. 

"Oh,  don't!"  she  answered.  "Not  even  in  fun! 
I — expect  I'm  nervous,  but  I  can't  bear  even  the 
word."  She  caught  a  little  sharp  breath.  "Oh, 
David,"  she  cried,  "we  must  be  very,  very  happy 
together,  we  two!  We  must!  We've  got  to  prove 
to  them  all  that  they're  wrong  and  that  we're  right. 
They  all  expect  us  to  fail,  you  know — every  one  of 
them,  from  my  aunt  to  your  terrible  Mr.  Henley, 
who  has  cast  you  off — even  the  Farings!  They're 
all  against  it — all!" 

David  nodded  towards  the  two  men  in  front  of 
them,  but  she  shook  her  head. 

"They're  both  French,"  she  said.     "Neither  of 
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them  understands  English  unless  you  speak  it  very 
slowly  and  in  words  of  one  syllable.  They  can't 
understand  what  I'm  saying.  David!"  she  cried, 
"why  can't  I  make  you  happy?  Why?  It's  I 
they're  all  afraid  of,  you  know,  not  you.  They're 
afraid  for  you.  They  think  I'm  wrecking  you. 
Every  one  of  them  thinks  so.  Why  can't  I  make 
you  happy  as  well  as  another?  I've  wanted  so  to 
be  happy!  And  I've  never  been.  Why  shouldn't 
I  have  my  chance  like  other  people?  I  want  to 
live.  I'm  a  woman  like  other  women.  Why 
shouldn't  I  have  my  chance  to  live  like  the  others  ? 
Have  I  got  to  lose  everything  that  is  worth  while, 
just  because  I'm  not  always  well  ?  Have  I  ?"  She 
turned  about  in  her  seat  and  pressed  close  to  David, 
looking  into  his  eyes.  Her  face  was  very  white, 
and  David  could  feel  through  the  heavy  furs  that 
she  was  shaking.  "Dear,  I  want  you  to  tell  me 
something — to  tell  me  the  truth,  on  your  honor. 
You've  said  it  all  many  times  before  in  other  ways, 
but  never  in  just  these  words.  I  want  you  to  tell 
me  that  you — believe  in  us  and  in  our  happiness, 
that  you  honestly  believe  we  are  going  to  be  happy 
together ;  not  hope  it,  but  believe  it.  I  want  you 
to  say  that  you  think  all  those  people  are  wrong 
in  being  afraid." 

David  took  her  hands  in  his  and  tried  to  soothe 
her,  for  he  saw  that  the  fatigue  and  excitement  of 
the  day,  together  with  what  she  had  seen  or  im 
agined  to  be  the  disapproving  attitude  of  her 
friends  and  his,  had  wrought  her  up  to  a  pitch  of 

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nervousness  which  easily  might  become  hysterical 
if  it  were  not  curbed  in  time. 

"Oh,  my  dear,  my  dear,"  said  he,  "you're  im 
agining  all  sorts  of  dreadful  things  and  you  must 
stop  it  or  you'll  make  us  unhappy  all  of  your  own 
accord.  Those  people  don't  feel  in  the  least  as  you 
think  they  do.  You're  making  it  up  yourself. 
And  if  they  did — if  every  one  in  the  world  were 
against  us,  what  should  we  care?  Our  life's  our 
own,  and  it's  going  to  be  a  happier  life  than  those 
people  could  even  imagine.  So  don't  worry  your 
self  over  anything.  They  can't  make  us  unhappy. 
We've  our  happiness  in  our  own  hands." 

"Give  me  your  word  of  honor  that  you  believe 
in  us,  David!"  she  cried. 

"I  give  you  my  word  of  honor,  dear,"  he  an 
swered.  For  some  obscure  reason  the  words  were 
hard  to  say,  and  yet  he  thought  they  were  true. 

Violet  drew  a  quick  little  sigh  and  sank  back  in 
her  place.  She  continued  to  hold  to  one  of  his 
hands,  but  she  closed  her  eyes  again  and  did  not 
speak  for  a  long  time. 

They  reached  their  destination  with  the  twilight, 
and  ran  swiftly  in  through  the  long,  high-banked 
lane  where  the  dusk  was  already  glooming  to  dark 
ness,  sounding  their  horn  to  warn  the  servants  at 
the  cottage  of  their  arrival. 

The  housekeeper,  a  motherly  middle-aged  woman 
was  at  the  door  to  meet  them,  with  the  other  ser 
vants  ranged  behind. 

"Like  a  picture  in  an  English  book,"  David  said, 
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with  a  little  laugh,  "'The  Homecoming,'  or  some 
thing  like  that." 

The  woman  greeted  them  very  pleasantly,  say 
ing  that  she  hoped  they  had  not  been  too  cold  on 
the  long  ride  from  town.  She  called  Violet  "Mrs. 
Rivers,  ma'am,"  and  the  two  looked  at  each  other 
with  a  quick  flush,  for  it  was  the  first  time  any  one 
had  used  that  name. 

Violet  was  borne  away  by  the  housekeeper  and  a 
maid,  and  a  man  showed  David  to  his  dressing- 
room,  where  his  dinner  clothes  had  been  laid  out, 
and  gave  him  a  drink  to  take  away  the  chill  of  the 
keen  evening  air. 

An  hour  later  he  knocked  at  his  wife's  door,  and, 
at  her  word,  entered.  She  had  finished  dressing, 
had  sent  her  maid  away,  and  was  standing  idle 
beside  one  of  the  long  windows  looking  out  into  the 
darkening  night. 

David  went  across  the  room,  and  she  turned  and 
put  up  her  hands  to  him. 

"So  now  we  begin,  David,"  she  said,  quite 
soberly.  David  gave  a  little  laugh. 

"Oh,"  said  he,  "I  should  have  thought  we  be 
gan  with  the  ceremony!" 

"Ah,  the  ceremony!"  she  said.  "That's  a  mere 
ceremony,  having  words  said  over  one  before  wit 
nesses.  That's  the  outside  of  it.  But  now  we 
really  begin  when  you  come  into  my  room  like 
this — and  have  the  right  to  come,  and  when  pres 
ently  we  go  down-stairs  to  dinner  and  sit  across 
the  table  from  each  other.  Do  you  know  we've 

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never  eaten  a  meal  alone  together?  I  was  think 
ing  of  that  just  before  you  came  in.  Are  you 
afraid,  David?"  she  said,  looking  up  into  his  face. 

"Afraid  of  dining  alone  with  you?"  inquired 
David.  But  he  saw  her  frown  and  sobered  to  her 
own  mood  of  gravity.  "No,  my  dear,"  said  he, 
"  I'm  too  sure  to  be  afraid.  And  so  are  you." 

She  looked  a  long  time  into  his  eyes. 

"And  still,"  she  said,  finally,  "I'm  afraid.  It's 
such  a  risk  that  two  people  take  when  they  agree 
to  go  through  a  whole  lifetime  together.  Oh  yes, 
I'm  a  nervous  fool,  if  you  like!  I'm  hysterical  and 
anything  else  you  may  like  to  call  me,  but — I've 
never  been  married  before,  and  I'm  afraid."  She 
tried  to  laugh,  but  it  was  a  poor  laugh.  "  What  if 
the  others  were  right,  after  all?"  she  continued. 
"My  aunt  and  the  Farings  and  your  Mr.  Henley! 
What  if  they  were  right  and  we  wrong?" 

"They  weren't,  my  dear,"  said  David.  "They 
weren't.  They  know  nothing  about  it.  Come! 
there's  the  dinner  gong.  We  must  go  down. 
Come!" 

She  turned  to  go  with  him,  but,  on  the  stairs,  she 
pressed  against  his  arm. 

"I  want  to  think  so!"  she  said.  "Oh,  I  want  to 
think  so !  But  how  is  one  to  be  sure  ?  I'm  afraid — 
afraid,  David,  afraid!" 


CHAPTER  XIX 

BEATRIX  FARING  knocked  at  the  door  of 
that  room  which  her  lord,  for  some  obscure 
reason,  called  his  "study,"  and,  when  she  heard  his 
voice,  went  in.  Faring,  who  was  seated  in  a  large 
and  very  comfortable  chair  of  stuffed  leather,  gave 
a  little  exclamation  of  pleasure  when  he  saw  his 
wife,  and  pushed  the  heap  of  evening  newspapers 
from  his  knees  to  the  floor.  He  held  out  a  hand, 
and  Beatrix  came  and  perched  upon  one  broad  arm 
of  the  leather  chair,  holding  herself  by  her  husband's 
shoulder. 

"  Jebbs  said  that  you  had  come  in,"  she  remarked, 
"so  I  thought  you  had  probably  stolen  off  here  to 
hide  yourself.  What  did  you  do  it  for?" 

"  Well,  you  had  people  in  the  drawing-room  when 
I  came  in,"  responded  Faring,  guiltily,  "  and  I  didn't 
feel  up  to  them,  so  I  fled  here.  Who  were  they? 
I  didn't  ask.  I  just  heard  a  sound  of  voices  and 
promptly  ran  away." 

"I  wish  you'd  asked,  or  had  come  in,  anyhow," 
said  Mrs.  Faring.  "  It's  a  pity.  David  and  Violet 
Rivers  were  there.  They  go  to  North  Carolina, 
somewhere  in  the  pine  woods,  to-morrow.  I'm 
sorry  you  didn't  see  them." 

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"  Yes,  I  'm  sorry,  too, ' '  said  he.  "  More  than  sorry. 
How  are  they  looking?" 

Mrs.  Faring  frowned  away  across  the  room  for  a 
few  moments  and  did  not  answer.  When  at  length 
she  turned  her  head  back,  her  husband  saw  that  her 
eyes  were  troubled. 

"Oh,  Harry,  I  wish  they  hadn't  done  it,"  she 
answered.  "  I  wish  it  almost  more  than  anything 
I  can  think  of." 

Faring  nodded  a  slow  head. 

"Ah!"  said  he.  "Yes,  I  was  afraid,  myself. 
Oh,  poor  David!" 

"They're  not  looking  well,"  said  the  woman,  at 
last  answering  his  question.  "Violet  is  white  as 
paper  and  thinner  than  I  ever  saw  her  before,  and 
more  nervous;  and  David —  Oh,  Harry,  poor 
David  has  at  last  'grown  up,'  as  we  told  him  in 
joke  he  never  would.  He  looks  much  older  than 
he  did  a  month  ago.  I  don't  know  what  has  hap 
pened  to  them,  but  it's  all  very  tragic.  Oh  yes! 
I  suppose  in  a  way  I  do  know,  too.  They've  just 
found  out  that  they  don't  belong,  and  it's  hurting 
them  cruelly.  It  hurt  me  cruelly  to  see  them." 

"Poor  David!"  said  Faring  again.  "It's  a  facer 
for  the  lad,  I've  no  doubt."  And  Beatrix  looked 
down  at  him  thoughtfully. 

"We  both  say  'Poor  David!'"  said  she.  "We 
don't  say  'Poor  Violet!'  Well — there's  something 
in  David  that  one  has  to  love,  something  very  young 
and  sweet  and  unspoiled.  I  admire  Violet.  I  al 
ways  have  admired  her,  and  I — I'm  sorry  for  her, 

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but  I'm  afraid  it's  David  I  feel  the  more  deeply 
about.  Harry,  Harry!  Why  did  we  let  them  do 
it?" 

"  We  couldn't  have  stopped  them,  Betty!"  replied 
the  man.  "  There's  no  stopping  people  when  they 
both  want  to  marry.  Even  David's  savage  old 
guardian-man — what's  his  name? — Henley!  Even 
old  Henley  couldn't  stop  David.  And  I  think 
nothing  could  have  stopped  the  girl.  It  was  her 
doing,  I  expect." 

"Yes,  but  why,  why?"  said  Mrs.  Faring.  "Why 
did  she  choose  David,  of  all  people  ?  He  wasn't  her 
sort," 

"My  dear,"  said  the  man,  "a  very  long  time  ago 
a  certain  Spanish  gentleman  took  a  long  and  ex 
pensive  and  hazardous  journey  into  an  unknown 
land  in  search  of  the  thing  which  made  Violet 
Winter  marry  David  Rivers.  The  Spanish  gentle 
man's  name  was  Ponce  de  Leon." 

"The  Fountain  of  Youth!"  said  Beatrix,  slowly. 
"Ah!  Yes,  I  see!  You  make  me  think  of  some 
thing  she  said  to  me  once  a  year  or  so  ago.  She 
said,  in  a  fierce,  bitter  sort  of  way:  'I  want  to  live! 
I  want  to  live  the  life  other  people  live,  and  I  can't. 
I  can't!  It's  all  I  can  do  to  drag  my  wretched,  frail 
body  about  and  go  through  this  ghastly  imitation 
of  a  life  that  you  see.'  I  remember  that  it  struck 
me  at  the  time  as  one  of  the  most  pathetically  tragic 
speeches  I  had  ever  heard,  and  one  of  the  most 
pathetically  tragic  situations,  that  passion  of  long 
ing  to  'live,'  as  she  called  it — to  feel  strong,  healthy 

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blood  in  her  veins,  to  do  the  things  that  are  com 
monplaces  to  most  women,  to  be  like  her  kind ;  and 
then  to  realize  that,  short  of  a  miracle,  her  frail  body 
would  never  permit  it  to  be.  That's  tragedy,  if  you 
like,  Harry!" 

"And  David,"  said  the  man,  nodding,  "David 
was  to  enact  the  role  of  miracle !  Again  I  say,  very 
earnestly,  'Poor  David!'" 

"Violet  often  said,"  mused  Mrs.  Faring,  "that 
David,  more  than  any  one,  made  her  a  child  once 
more.  '  She  often  said  that  if  she  could  honestly 
believe  the  things  David  believed  there  would  be 
nothing  impossible  to  her." 

"Well,"  said  Faring,  "she  tried.  She  staked 
everything,  and,  I  fancy,  lost — carrying  poor  David 
down  in  the  wreck,  of  course.  By  gad,  I — I  wish  it 
needn't  have  been  David!  I'm  fond  of  that  boy. 
He  must  have  been  mad — stark,  staring  mad,  to 
allow  himself  to  be  let  in  for  it  all." 

Mrs.  Faring  slipped  an  arm  around  her  husband's 
neck,  as  she  sat  beside  him. 

"I  think  he  was  lonely,  Harry!"  said  she.  "We 
knew  what  that  meant  once — both  of  us."  Faring 
drew  her  arm  suddenly  close  to  him.  "  And  he  ad 
mired  Violet,  and — well,  I  suppose  it  happened.  I 
think,"  she  went  on,  after  a  silence,  "I  think  that 
men  like  David — men  with  exquisite  imaginations 
and  unspoiled  ideals — ought  never  to  marry  at  all 
unless  they  can  marry  the  one  woman  in  the  world' 
who  means  to  them  heaven  and  earth,  and  fire  and 
starlight,  and  hope  and  religion,  and  dreams-come- 

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true — everything  they  love  and  worship;  for  they 
can  never  adapt  themselves  to  any  lesser  woman  or 
get  over  the  shock  of  finding  that  she's  not  the  one. 
Ordinary  men,  unimaginative  men,  can  marry  al 
most  any  one  who  is  attractive  and  congenial,  and 
get  on  very  fairly  well ;  but  the  Davids  of  this  world 
are  different.  They've  spent  their  lives  picturing 
to  themselves  too  poignant  an  ecstasy  to  be  able 
to  put  up  with  cheaper  stuff." 

"And yet,"  Faring  argued, " David  must  have  re 
alized  from  the  beginning  that  Violet  Winter  wasn't 
the  fairy-book  queen  he'd  been  hoping  for." 

"Oh,  Harry,"  said  she,  "that  realization  comes 
after  marriage,  not  before.  Men  of  David's  sort, 
who  have  led  clean  lives,  are  in  a  way  like  girls.  I 
don't  mean  effeminate;  David's  as  far  as  possible 
from  that.  It  is  only  after  marriage  that  they  wake 
to  the  might-have-beens.  Poor  David!  I'm  afraid 
he  is  facing  the  might-have-beens  very  bitterly  just 
now." 

"  Ay,  there's  the  rub!"  said  Faring.  "  What  is  it 
going  to  do  to  him?  Cripple  him?  Cripple  his 
work?" 

The  woman  gave  a  little  cry. 

"Oh  no,  Harry!  No!"  she  said.  "Oh,  I  hope 
not!  I  wonder.  He's  sensitive,  David  is.  A 
shock,  if  it  were  severe  enough,  might  hurt  him 
badly.  I  wonder.  You  see,  David's  work  has 
succeeded  because  it  was  so — fresh,  unspoiled;  be 
cause  he  looked  at  the  world  with  such  cheerful, 
glad,  boyish  eyes  that  saw  beauty  everywhere.  It 

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was  a  creed  to  him,  almost — his  belief  in  beauty  and 
happiness !  I  wonder —  Oh,  if  this  should  kill  that 
sweetness  and  belief  in  him,  poor  David  would  be 
lost  indeed!  Do  you  think  it  will  do  that  to  him, 
Harry  ?  Do  you  ? ' ' 

Faring  got  to  his  feet  with  a  little  sigh. 

"God  knows!"  said  he. — "Ah!  there  goes  the 
dressing-bell.  We  must  be  off. — God  knows,  not  I ! 
In  any  case,  though,  I  should  say  that  the  poor 
lad's  fate  is  beyond  us — in  other  hands  now." 

"In  whose  hands?"  she  asked. 

"Oh,  in  the  hands  of  the  villainess,  of  course," 
said  he.  "The  Dark  Lady!  She's  the  only  one 
who  can  save  him  or  damn  him  now.  And  she'll 
come  to  realize  that  herself,  presently.  Violet's  no 
fool. — I  wonder  which  she'll  do.  By  Jove,  I 
wonder!" 


CHAPTER  XX 

HARRY  and  Beatrix  Faring  summed  up  in  few 
words  and  not  unskilfully  the  gigantic  mistake 
in  the  Rivers'  marriage.  The  mistake  was  a  blun 
der  of  motive.  Violet  married  David  Rivers  for 
motives  that,  stripped  of  their  scarce  concealing 
drapery,  were  selfish  motives,  one  and  all.  She 
sought  the  fabulous  Fountain  of  Youth,  and  that 
fountain,  despite  the  eager  searching  of  centuries, 
has  never  yet  been  found.  David's  motives  remain 
more  obscure,  but  it  is  possible  that  Beatrix  Faring 
groped  near  to  them  when  she  said:  "I  think  he 
was  lonely.  .  .  .  And  he  admired  Violet,  and — well; 
I  suppose  it  happened." 

The  Rivers  marriage  was  not  the  first  which  had 
been  built  upon  such-like  foundations.  It  was  not 
by  many  thousands  the  first  time  that  a  man — a  boy 
in  all  essentials,  an  enthusiast,  a  prodigious  opti 
mist — has  mistaken  admiration  and  intellectual 
sympathy  for  a  warmer  thing.  It  must  be  remem 
bered  that,  in  all,  he  had  known  few  women,  and 
that  this  woman  was  very  clever  and  very  widely 
courted  and  sought.  It  was  a  severe  test  to  be 
chosen  out  of  all  the  world  by  such  an  one.  It  has 
turned  older  heads  than  David's. 

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And  yet  it  must  not  be  understood  from  all  this 
that  the  two  found  themselves  from  the  very  be 
ginning  plunged  into  a  dark  and  grim  misery. 
They  were  mentally,  at  least,  too  sympathetic  for 
that;  they  had  too  many  tastes  and  interests  in 
common.  Indeed,  it  would  be  difficult,  if  not  im 
possible  to  say:  "Here  or  there,  at  this  time  or  at 
that  time,  the  chill  fog  of  disillusionment  first  set 
tled  upon  the  two  and  dimmed  to  their  eyes  the 
sunshine  of  hope  and  ambition." 

They  had  many  long  days  of  a  very  sweet  and 
intimate  communion  during  that  first  month  of 
honeymoon  by  the  sea,  and,  indeed,  long  afterwards ; 
for  at  this  time,  as  always  before,  they  were  very 
close  to  each  other  in  mental  understanding.  As 
Violet  said,  they  spoke  a  common  language  which 
required  very  few  words  and  no  explanations. 

"We're  such  excellent  friends,  David!"  she  said 
to  him  once.  "  And  I  think  very  few  married  peo 
ple  are  that — young  married  people,  anyway.  We 
interest  each  other  so  keenly!  I  expect  some  day 
we  shall  have  said  it  all,  talked  it  all  over,  talked 
ourselves  inside  out,  and  then  we  shall,  have  to  turn 
to  other  people  for  entertainment.  But  I'm  rather 
sure  that  the  time  will  be  longer  with  us  than  it  is 
with  most." 

And  yet,  in  this  very  fact  of  intellectual  compati 
bility,  or  in  the  fact  that  they  dwelt  so  insistently 
upon  it,  stood  a  significant  danger  and  a  warning 
that  something  was  absent  which  should  have  been 
there.  It  is  a  bad  thing  when  two  young  people, 

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not  a  month  married,  are  forced  to  dwell  upon  their 
mental  sympathy.  But  if  the  danger  and  the 
warning  presented  themselves  to  these  two  they 
gave  no  sign,  but  shut  their  eyes  and  went  on  their 
chosen  way. 

It  seems  certain  that  the  woman  must  have  suf 
fered  her  agony — and  hidden  it.  The  very  incom 
petence  of  her  frail  body,  the  thinned,  anaemic 
blood,  the  racked  nerves,  to  face  the  facts  of  wife- 
hood  must  have  been  a  very  exquisite  torture  to 
her,  must  have  wrung  her  sorely.  But  if  she  suf 
fered,  David  never  knew.  He  was  spared  at  least 
that. 

He  could  not  fail  to  see,  however,  that  as  the 
weeks  went  on  his  wife  grew  no  stronger,  and  looked 
no  more  robust  in  spite  of  the  very  simple  out-door 
life  they  were  leading.  He  spoke  of  this  to  her  once 
or  twice,  but  she  either  laughed  at  him  or  met  him 
with  impatience,  according  to  her  capricious  mood, 
and  he  learned  to  hold  his  tongue.  But  when  their 
month  in  the  Paring's  cottage  was  ended,  he  pro 
posed  that  they  go  South  for  the  winter,  and  Violet 
agreed.  En  route  they  stopped  a  few  days  in  New 
York,  and  it  was  then  that  Beatrix  Faring  saw  them 
and  reported  to  her  lord  that  the  tragedy  had  begun. 

They  went  to  a  certain  resort  among  the  pines 
of  North  Carolina.  There  were  few  people  in 
December,  for  the  season  properly  did  not  begin 
until  February,  and  David  suggested  that  they 
would  do  well  to  go  farther  south  for  a  month  or 
two — to  Palm  Beach  or  Nassau  or  to  Jamaica, 
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"You'll  be  lonely  here,"  he  said  to  Violet.  "It 
will  be  unbearingly  dull  for  you."  But  she  refused 
to  go. 

"  We  didn't  come  away  from  New  York  to  play," 
she  objected.  "  We  came  to  work.  You  can  work 
here  just  because  it  is  so  quiet  and  dull,  and  as  for 
me,  I  don't  want  a  lot  of  people  about.  I  feel  no 
inclination  at  all  to  be  gay.  And,  besides,  I  think 
this  pure  air  is  good  for  me.  I  sleep  better  in  it 
than  I've  done  for  a  long  time." 

So  they  remained.  They  had  taken  one  of  the 
small  cottages  which  belonged  to  the  chief  hotel  of 
the  place,  and  lived  as  much  apart  from  the  other 
guests  as  they  wished,  taking  their  meals  sometimes 
in  their  own  cottage  and  sometimes  in  the  hotel,  as 
they  felt  variously  inclined.  And  David  made  an 
honest  attempt  to  work  upon  some  short  stories 
which  he  had  arranged  to  do  for  old  John  Cowper, 
but  even  while  he  wrought  he  knew  that  he  was 
failing.  The  desire  for  work,  the  joy  of  creation, 
was  not  in  him.  He  felt  only  a  heavy  lethargy 
which  seemed  to  grow  heavier  and  more  deadening 
day  by  day. 

And  Violet  herself,  in  spite  of  her  eagerness  and 
sympathy,  hampered  him  greatly.  Like  almost 
all  people  who  have  never  been  brought  personally 
into  contact  with  the  practice  of  an  art,  she  had  no 
conception  whatever  of  an  artist's  requirements 
in  the  way  of  time  and  uninterrupted  solitude. 
She  talked  constantly  of  how  free  she  wished  him 
to  be  of  her,  but  in  reality  she  seldom  left  him  free, 

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and  was  hurt  if  he  shut  himself  away  from  her  for 
more  than  an  hour. 

To  be  sure,  in  this  matter,  David's  very  irregular 
habits  of  work  were  in  part  at  fault.  He  had  been 
used  to  working  when  in  the  mood,  both  night  and 
day,  for  many  hours  at  a  stretch,  and  there  had 
been  no  one  but  himself  to  consider.  If  he  chose 
to  sit  all  day  over  his  table,  with  no  more  recreation 
than  was  to  be  obtained  through  tramping  up  and 
down  the  room,  his  brain  busy  the  while;  or,  if  it 
suited  him  to  work  until  two  or  three  o'clock  of  the 
night,  oblivious  of  time  and  place,  there  had  been 
no  one  to  be  inconvenienced  by  it.  All  his  work 
had  been  accomplished  in  this  reprehensible  manner, 
and  it  is  difficult  for  even  a  young  man  all  at  once 
to  alter  his  most  important  habits. 

So  quite  naturally  a  little  friction  arose  between 
the  two  over  this  matter  (in  particular  as  Violet 
honestly  imagined  herself  to  be  leaving  her  husband 
quite  free),  and  they  were  in  no  state  to  bear  addi 
tional  friction. 

Still,  with  difficulty,  struggling  bravely  against 
the  lethargy  which  enwrapped  him  and  made  work 
distasteful,  stealing  such  hours  as  he  could  find  for 
the  task,  David  managed  at  the  end  of  a  month  or 
six  weeks  to  complete  two  little  stories  and  sent 
them  off  to  New  York  to  be  typed  and  delivered  to 
John  Cowper.  There  had  been  no  joy  in  their  mak 
ing,  and  he  knew  that  they  were  not  of  his  best,  but 
he  waited  for  news  of  them  with  the  fearful  eager 
ness  of  those  early  days  of  his  beginnings. 

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The  reply  came  promptly,  in  ten  days'  time. 
David  and  Violet  happened  to  be  returning  home 
from  a  walk  among  the  pines  when  a  boy  from  the 
hotel,  on  his  way  to  their  cottage,  met  them  with 
the  morning's  post.  Violet  took  the  half-dozen 
letters  and  chose  her  own  from  among  them. 

"Oh,  there's  one  from  your  publisher  people!" 
she  said.  "  It  must  be  from  Mr.  Cowper,  about  the 
two  stories.  That  means  that  they've  taken  them, 
doesn't  it?  David,  I'm  so  glad!  You'll  feel  better 
pleased  with  yourself  to  know  that  you've  accom 
plished  something  instead  of  just  lying  about  all 
the  winter." 

David  took  the  letter  and  laughed. 

"Yes.  I  expect  they've  taken  the  things,"  he 
said.  "Of  course  I'm  glad."  He  tore  open  the 
envelope  and  read  the  letter  through ;  then  he  turned 
a  little  away  and  stood  silent,  crumpling  the  paper 
in  his  two  hands.  Violet  came  round  to  face  him. 

"^David!  David!"  she  said,  in  a  sharp  whisper. 
"  What's  wrong  ?  What  is  the  matter  ?  What  does 
Mr.  Cowper  say?" 

"He  has — saved  me  some  trouble,"  said  David, 
slowly.  "  He  has  torn  the  things  up  for  me.  He's 
rather — indignant  about  them,  I  take  it.  He  says 
— a  school-boy  could  have  bettered  them."  The 
woman  burst  out  in  a  storm  of  nervous  anger,  but 
David  turned  away  from  her  again  and  went  into 
the  house. 

Later  she  followed  him  there,  and  besought  him, 
anxiously. 

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"What  do  you  think  is  the  matter,  David?"  she 
demanded.  "  It's — absurd !  You  can't  do  bad  work. 
You've  never  done  bad  work  in  your  life.  That 
wretched  Cowper  man  is  insane.  I  won't  believe 
that  the  things  were  bad.  Certainly  you  had  every 
chance  to  do  your  best.  You  haven't  been  pressed, 
and  Heaven  knows  I've  stayed  away  and  let  you 
alone  so  that  you  could  work." 

David  smiled  upon  her  gently. 

"  Don't  worry,  my  dear!"  said  he.  "  It's  all  right. 
Quite  all  right!  Of  course  these  things  were  bad, 
but — one  can't  always  be  at  the  top  of  his  powers. 
I  expect  I'm  passing  through  the  stage  that  every 
writer-man  has  to  experience  at  some  time  or  other. 
I'm — stale,  I  expect.  You  see,  I've  worked  almost 
unceasingly  for  more  than  two  years,  with  little  or 
no  rest,  and,  as  a  result,  I've  gone  a  bit  stale.  I 
shall  be  all  right  after  a  time.  It's  all  quite  natural, 
so  don't  you  worry!  Run  away  and  read  your  let 
ters.  I  must  write  to  Cowper." 

She  went,  still  expressing  wonder  and  indignation 
and  a  little  fretfulness  because  so  much  time  had 
been  wasted  to  no  purpose;  but  David  sat  alone 
for  a  long  while,  staring  into  the  veiled  future  with 
a  cold  fear  at  his  heart. 

He  made  no  further  attempts  to  write  as  winter 
wore  on  and  drew  towards  spring,  but  rather  tried 
as  earnestly  as  he  could  to  keep  his  mind  altogether 
away  from  it  and  to  devote  his  entire  attention  to 
his  wife. 

In  February,  when  people  from  the  North  began 

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to  pour  into  the  little  resort,  they  left,  Violet  having 
become  restless  and  eager  for  a  change,  and  went 
farther  south,  to  St.  Augustine  and  to  Palm  Beach, 
and  finally,  by  boat  from  Miami,  across  to  Nassau, 
and  there  settled  down  for  a  two  months'  stay. 

"The  Walls  of  Destiny"  was,  at  about  this  time, 
produced  in  New  York,  the  prominent  actor,  who 
had  been  ill,  having  recovered  sufficiently  to  take 
up  work  again.  David  would  have  been  glad  to  be 
present  for  the  first  night,  but  Violet  shrank  from 
the  long  journey  and  he  would  not  go  without  her. 
So  he  contented  himself  with  telegraph  messages, 
and,  later  on,  more  fully  by  letters,  and  was  a  little 
cheered  to  find  that  the  play  bade  fair  to  be  as  suc 
cessful  in  America  as  in  England.  At  the  least  it 
meant  a  continuation  of  income,  and  that,  in  these 
sterile,  unproductive  days,  was  some  comfort  to  him. 

It  seemed  to  please  Violet  also ;  for  she  talked  of 
it  a  great  deal,  and  was  disposed  to  regret  that  they 
had  not  gone  to  New  York  for  the  occasion.  She 
conceived  a  new  idea  and  imparted  it  to  David. 

"  Why  don't  you  write  plays  ?"  she  said.  "  There's 
heaps  of  money  in  them.  Look  at  the  income 
you've  had  already  from  the  English  production  of 
this  one  and  will  have  from  the  American  produc 
tion.  And  at  that,  you  are  getting  only  half  the 
royalties,  because  the  playwright,  who  has  done 
nothing  but  arrange  the  story,  gets  half.  Why 
don't  you  write  plays  yourself?" 

David  retorted,  rather  sharply,  that  it  might  be 
better  to  wait  until  he  was  able  to  write  something 

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in  his  own  proper  field,  for,  though  he  had  tried  to 
put  it  quite  away  from  him,  he  was  thoroughly 
frightened  over  the  utter  failure  of  the  two  short 
stories,  and  over  the  entire  and  persistent  lack  of  the 
creative  impulse  in  him. 

"Oh  yes,"  said  the  woman.  "You're  thinking 
about  those  two  stories  that  Mr.  Cowper  wouldn't 
take.  That  was  very  odd.  I've  often  wondered 
about  it.  I  hope  this  stale  period  of  yours,  as  you 
call  it,  won't  last  long.  People  forget  a  writer  so 
quickly  nowadays." 

David  winced,  for  the  speech  hurt  him ;  but  out 
wardly  he  smiled,  and  said  that  doubtless  he  should 
be  able  to  do  something  before  long. 

Violet  was  constantly  saying  things  of  this  kind 
to  him,  seemingly  quite  without  the  realization  that 
they  might  hurt,  and  it  puzzled  him  very  much. 
Before  their  marriage  she  had  seemed  exceedingly 
quick  to  feel  with  him  and  to  understand.  Her 
swift  and  sensitive  intuition  had  been  one  of  her 
greatest  charms,  and  within  a  few  short  months 
that  appeared  to  have  deserted  her  almost  alto 
gether.  David  could  not  understand  why.  He 
did  not  realize  that  almost  every  emotion  or  mental 
quality  the  woman  possessed  had  been  transmuted 
by  the  shock  of  disappointment  into  a  fiercely 
bitter  self-pity.  She  was,  in  these  days,  mourning 
over  the  dead  body  of  her  hopes,  and,  as  often 
happens,  sorrow  made  her  selfish.  David's  feelings 
and  concerns  came  to  her  from  very  far  away,  and 
she  could  not  respond  to  them. 

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There  chanced  to  be  staying  in  their  hotel,  at 
just  this  time,  a  very  famous  physician,  a  specialist 
in  certain  branches.  They  had  talked  with  him 
and  walked  with  him,  and,  on  one  or  two  occasions, 
had  gone  upon  little  boating  excursions  in  the  same 
party.  David  pressed  his  wife  to  consult  the  great 
man  professionally,  if  it  could  be  arranged,  for  he 
was  becoming  alarmed  at  her  increasing  nervous 
ness  and  pallor,  and  at  her  thinness,  which  was 
almost  emaciation.  She  met  the  suggestion  at  first 
irritably,  saying: 

"Don't  torment  me,  David!  I'm  all  right. 
There's  nothing  the  matter  with  me.  I'm  well 
enough,  or  as  well  as  I  shall  ever  be.  I  wish  you'd 
let  me  alone."  But  when  he  continued  to  press 
her  she  at  last  gave  in  to  him — "  to  have  done  with 
the  bother,"  she  put  it. 

So  David  arranged  a  consultation,  and  while  it 
was  forward  smoked  on  the  hotel  porch  waiting  for 
the  verdict.  The  great  man  came  down  to  him 
after  an  hour,  and  was  graciously  pleased  to  accept 
a  cigar  and  a  light. 

"Your  wife,  my  dear  man,"  he  said,  puffing  at 
the  cigar,  and  taking  it  from  his  lips  to  regard  it 
approvingly — "your  wife  is  a  sign  of  the  times. 
She,  and  many  like  her,  are  the  penalty  we  pay  for 
making  too  much  of  a  fuss  over  our  women.  The 
women  were  better  off  in  the  Stone  Age,  much 
better  off." 

David  essayed  an  appreciative  laugh,  but  his 
eyes  were  anxious. 

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"What's  wrong?"  he  asked. 

"  Nothing,"  said  the  great  man,  "and  everything. 
Mrs.  Rivers  has  no  vital  malady,  though  I  want  to 
have  another  look  at  her  in  six  months'  time. 
There's  something  which  may  have  to  be  checked 
later  on ;  but,  to  use  a  nautical  figure,  she's  over- 
engined  for  her  beam  and  draught.  Too  much 
nerve  irritation,  too  little  bodily  strength  to  manage 
it.  That's  no  news  to  you,  of  course."  He  scowled 
across  at  the  palms  of  the  hotel  garden.  "  These  frail, 
anaemic,  thin-blooded  people,"  he  continued,  "  ought 
by  rights  to  have  anaemic,  thin-blooded  tempera 
ments,  but  God  knows  they  often  haven't.  They 
are  filled  with  a  passionate  desire,  that  is  almost  a 
monomania,  to  lead  the  normal  life  of  stronger 
women,  but  they  can't  do  it.  Consequently,  they 
wear  themselves  to  shreds  with  fretting  over  it. 
That's  your  wife,  sir,  in  a  nutshell.  I  fancy  she 
had  great  hopes  that  marriage  would  make  a  cure. 
Well,  sometimes  it  does.  When  these  nervous, 
under-vitalized  girls  come  to  me,  or  their  mothers 
come  to  me,  and  ask  if  they  dare  marry,  if  they 
have  a  right  to  marry  in  their  state  of  health,  I  say: 
'God  bless  you,  yes!  Marry,  by  all  means,  and 
bring  up  a  couple  of  youngsters.  That's  just  what 
you  need!  Take  your  mind  off  yourself,  that  will!' 
Well,  usually  it  is  just  what  they  need,  but  there 
are  some  cases —  It  isn't  always  a  cure.  No,  not 
always." 

"I  take  it,  then,"  said  David,  "that  it  is  nothing 
but  nerves?" 

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"That's  all — so  far,"  said  the  great  man.  "I'm 
no  prophet,  either  major  or  minor,  but  that's  about 
all — so  far.  Nerves,  and  fretting  too  much  over  the 
impossible." 

"What's  to  be  done?"  asked  David.  The  man 
of  medicine  hesitated. 

"  Change  of  air  and  scene, "  he  said,  rather  vaguely. 
"Time,  and  natural  adjustment.  Anything  which 
can  divert  the  mind.  Mrs.  Rivers  is  very  much 
taken  up  with  herself.  Make  her  see  more  people. 
Get  her  back  as  much  as  you  can  to  her  former 
environment,  if  she  thinks  that  would  amuse  her. 
Diversion,  diversion,  that's  the  main  thing.  Where 
do  you  get  these  cigars?" 

David  went  up  to  his  wife's  room,  and  found  her 
seated  by  the  window  with  her  hands  in  her  lap. 
She  greeted  him  with  a  wry  smile. 

"  Well,  David,  he  had  no  medicine  for  a  jaundiced 
soul,"  she  said.  "I'm  afraid  it  was  a  big  fee  for 
nothing." 

David  sat  down,  and  the  woman  rose  and  moved 
back  and  forth  across  the  room  once  or  twice. 

"And  yet,"  she  said,  coming  at  last  to  a  halt 
before  him,  "I'm  not  sure.  At  least  he  opened  my 
eyes  a  little  to  what  I've  been  doing.  I've  been  so 
busily  engaged  in  feeling  sorry  for  myself  that  I've 
been  very,  very  selfish.  I've  left  you  too  much  out 
of  consideration.  I  haven't  been  fair  to  you."  A 
sudden  little  nervous  spasm  shook  her  and  she 
pressed  her  hands  together  over  her  breast,  stand 
ing  before  him  in  the  light  of  the  window.  "Oh, 
226 


A    STUMBLING-BLOCK 

David,  I  had  such  hopes!  such  golden  hopes!"  she 
cried.  "You  had  done  so  much  for  me!  I  had 
become  almost  a  new  creature  through  knowing 
you,  and — caring  for  you,  and  trying  to  believe  the 
sweet,  good  things  you  believed.  I  thought  I  could 
go — all  the  way.  I  thought  that  if  I  married  you 
I  should  become  like  you,  young  once  more,  and 
eager  and  strong  and  hopeful  and — happy,  happy. 
I  might  have  known  that  there  are  no  miracles.  I 
might  have  known  that,  but  I  didn't.  I  was  a 
fool!"  She  spread  out  her  two  arms.  "Look  at 
me!"  she  said.  "See  what  I  have  become!  A 
ghastly  shadow  of  weak,  transparent  flesh!  A 
mockery  of  womanhood!  Oh,  David,  not  even 
you  could  save  me!  I  thought  you  could  and  so 
I  married  you,  but  you  couldn't.  Not  even  God 
could,  I  expect.  There  wasn't  enough  left  of  me 
to  save." 

The  entire  selfishness  of  her  attitude,  in  spite  of 
the  realization  she  thought  to  have  come  to,  seemed 
never  to  occur  to  her.  She  was  as  serious  and  as 
naive  as  a  child  over  her  woes,  and  as  sublimely 
unconscious  of  all  else  in  the  world. 

David  took  her  in  his  arms,  striving  to  comfort 
her. 

"Oh,  my  dear,  my  dear!"  said  he.  "If  there 
were  anything  I  could  do!  If  there  were  anything 
any  one  could  do !  Would  you  like  to  go  somewhere 
else?  We'll  get  away  from  here.  I  don't  believe 
you  like  it.  We'll  go  somewhere  where  there  will 
be  people  we  know.  That's  what  you  need!  I've 

227 


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been  rather  a  beast.  I've  kept  you  too  long  away 
from  other  people,  and  I  think  you're  actually 
bored."  He  managed  a  little  laugh.  "Where 
would  you  like  to  go  ?" 

She  flushed  a  little,  and  it  may  have  occurred  to 
her  that  since  their  marriage  they  had  done  little 
else  than  move  from  place  to  place,  as  her  whim 
dictated. 

"You're  very  good  to  me,  David,  dear,"  she  said. 
"You're  very  unselfish,  and  I'm  in  no  state  to  ap 
preciate  it  or  to  be  good  to  you  back  again.  I 
expect,  you  know,  that  you're  far  too  good  to  me. 
I  expect  we  should  be  much  better  off  if  you  would 
beat  me  occasionally.  They  say  beating  has  saved 
many  a  woman  from  nervous  wreck,  and  I  dare  say 
it's  true."  She  drew  away  from  him,  and  began 
again  to  walk  up  and  down  the  room.  "I  was 
thinking  vaguely  of  a  plan  before  you  came  up," 
she  said.  "  You  know  the  Carterets  and  the  Farings 
and  old  Mrs.  Crowley  and  Gerald  Livingstone  and 
Jimmy  Rogers  are  making  up  a  yachting-party  to 
spend  the  spring  and  summer  in  Gerald  Living 
stone's  yacht  in  the  Mediterranean  and,  later,  along 
the  Norwegian  coast.  I  had  a  letter  from  Beatrix 
Faring  yesterday,  asking  me  if  we  would  go.  Of 
course,  I  meant  to  answer  that  it  was  impossible, 
because  you  had  to  work — " 

"Oh,  as  for  that,"  said  David,  "that  doesn't 
matter  at  all.  If  you'd  care — "  But  she  checked 
him,  saying: 

"No,  wait,  wait.  I  knew  it  was  impossible  for 
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A   STUMBLING-BLOCK 

you,  and  I  know  it  now.  You've  your  work  to  do, 
David,  and  I  simply  must  not  stand  in  its  way.  I 
want  you  to  get  on  just  as  much  as  you  want  it 
yourself.  I've  tried  to  keep  out  of  your  way  and 
leave  you  free  during  these  last  few  months,  but  I 
expect  I  haven't  done  it  very  well.  I  didn't  know 
how.  Well,  something  that  doctor  said  made  me 
think  that — that  possibly  it  would  be  a  good  thing 
if  I  should  go  on  this  yachting-party  and  leave  you 
to  do  your  work.  It  sounds  absurd,  but  you'll  un 
derstand.  You  always  understand.  It  is  possi 
ble,"  she  continued,  a  bit  diffidently,  "that — that  a 
little  separation  would  be  good  for  us  both.  It's 
possible  that  we'd  —  be  able,  as  it  were,  to  start 
anew  afterwards — more  sensibly.  I  fancy  the  first 
months  of  marriage  are  always  trying.  Every  one 
says  so.  Maybe  we'd —  What  do  you  think?" 

"I  suppose  it  would  look  rather  odd?"  he  said, 
in  a  tone  of  question. 

The  woman  made  a  little,  impatient  gesture. 

"  So  few  people  would  know  of  it  at  all,"  she  said. 
"  And  those  few  could  be  trusted  not  to  think  absurd 
things.  Oh,  David!"  she  cried,  "you  understand, 
don't  you?  I  needn't  deal  with  you  in — in  words 
of  one  syllable.  You  always  understand.  It  isn't 
that  I — want  to  go  away  from  you,  but  that  doctor 
— well,  I  truly  believe  it  would  be  best  for  heaps  of 
reasons — your  work  and  my  health  and — no  end 
of  things.  I'm  thinking  of  the  future,  David.  I 
think  it  would  be  best.  Truly  I  do.  Try  to  under 
stand  me  without  making  me  say  it  all.  I'm  look- 

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ing  to  the  future  and  to  the  good  of  both  of  us. 
Shall  I  go?" 

"As  you  like,  dear,"  said  the  man.  " Do  as  you 
like.  Go  on  your  cruise.  I'll  go  to  Maine,  I  think, 
where  I  went  before,  and  try  to  work.  Perhaps  I 
shall  manage  a  book.  If  I  fail  it  won't  be  for  lack 
of  trying.  Yes,  go  on  your  cruise.  Come  back 
rested  and  strong  and  well,  and  I — I'll  do  my  part 
here.  I've  a  headful  of  ideas.  Something  should 
come  of  them,  I  think —  By  Jove,  I  wonder  what  ?" 


CHAPTER  XXI 

A  FORTNIGHT  later  they  went  North,  and, 
J\  with  the  beginning  of  May,  Violet  set  out 
with  the  Farings  to  join  her  yachting-party.  They 
went  upon  one  of  the  big  German  ships  which  ply 
between  New  York  and  the  Mediterranean  ports, 
for  they  were  to  meet  the  yacht  at  Naples,  and 
they  engaged  their  return  passage  to  America  for 
the  end  of  August. 

David,  left  alone,  went  at  once  to  the  little  village 
in  Maine  by  the  sea,  where  he  had  spent  that  never- 
to-be-forgotten  summer  in  which  The  Walls  of 
Destiny  came  into  being.  The  fisher  people  with 
whom  he  had  lived  before  welcomed  him  and  made 
him  comfortable.  The  season  was  early  and  warm — 
Nature,  as  it  were,  doing  her  sweet  best  for  him,  to 
make  up  for  those  barren  and  bitter  months.  All 
things  wrought  together  to  serve  his  needs;  and, 
"Oh,"  cried  David,  yearning  to  the  task,  "if  I 
cannot  work  here  and  now,  God  has  forgotten  me 
forever." 

Almost  from  the  first  he  discovered  himself  to  be 
in  a  strange  and  piteous  quandary.  As  he  tramped 
the  shore  in  the  keen,  clean  wind,  thrilling  to  the 
thought  that  he  was  free— free  for  weeks  and 

231 


A    STUMBLING-BLOCK 

months  to  come,  that,  with  the  dusk,  he  had  not, 
as  before,  to  creep  home  to  his  pretending,  but 
might  walk  erect,  free  and  alone,  from  night  to 
morning  as  from  morning  to  night;  as  he  rose  and 
swelled  to  a  free  man's  stature,  and  his  eyes  cleared 
of  the  shadows  and  mists  of  the  despair  of  bond 
age,  one  came  to  him  both  in  his  goings-out  and 
his  comings-in,  one  dwelt  visibly  before  him  in 
his  waking  hours  and  his  sleeping — slim,  white, 
virginal,  with  loving  eyes  that  searched  his  soul. 

And  the  heart  and  soul  and  spirit  of  him  leaped 
to  her  as  naturally  as  a  flame  leaps  to  the  sky,  as 
inevitably  as  a  flower  turns  to  the  sun  that  makes 
it.  All  his  being  rose  and  thrilled  to  her  eyes' 
tenderness,  all  the  unused,  unguessed  sweetness  in 
him  trembled  towards  her  and  poured  itself  at  her 
feet. 

He  saw  very  plainly  two  ways  before  him.  Here 
lay  open  to  his  eager  steps  the  golden  splendor  of 
this  White  Magic.  Opening  his  soul  to  its  beauty, 
dwelling  through  these  months  to  come  with  Rose 
mary's  sweet  image  always  before  him,  always 
thrilling  him  to  the  utmost  possible  heights,  his 
work,  born  of  ecstasy  and  reared  in  enchantment, 
must  be  a  thing  of  gold  and  precious  stones — a 
nobler  thing  than  his  self-centred  imaginings  had 
ever  before  brought  to  light.  A  new  and  greater 
success  lay  there  to  his  hand. 

But  he  looked  deep  into  Rosemary's  eyes,  and  he 
saw  the  other  way — dreary,  uninspired,  a  narrow, 
toilsome  path  towards  an  unknown  goal,  a  dark 

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way,  unillumined  by  the  golden  splendor  of  that 
White  Magic,  but  honest,  faithful  to  the  burden  he 
had  of  his  own  accord  set  upon  his  shoulders,  true 
to  his  parole  from  the  prison  walls. 

He  chose  his  way  and  watched  with  heavy  eyes 
the  vision  withdraw  itself  before  him,  and  grow 
faint  and  dim  with  the  distance.  The  sweet  eyes 
smiled  upon  him  as  they  drew  away — a  smile  say 
ing:  "Oh,  brave,  brave  Davie!"  but  he  could  not 
smile  back.  He  watched  till  the  splendor  was  gone, 
and  turned,  grim-faced,  to  his  grim  task. 

Still  the  work  was  begun,  and  went  forward  day 
by  day.  No  fine  frenzy  drove  it  on  in  an  impetuous 
rush,  but  David  toiled  unremittingly,  and  the  thing 
grew  under  his  hand  and  took  shape,  and  it  seemed 
to  him  that  it  was  good.  It  was  serious  work,  he 
said,  far  the  most  serious  that  he  had  ever  done; 
and,  if  it  lacked  the  old  youthful  buoyancy,  surely 
with  such  a  theme  buoyancy  would  have  been  out 
of  place.  In  a  sober  fashion  he  nodded  his  head 
over  the  thing,  and  was  glad  to  find  that  without  a 
swelling  inspiration  of  a  boyish  joy  in  the  fashion 
ing  he  could  do  work  so  solid  and  so  substantial 
and  so  worthy  of  mature  consideration.  He  felt 
that  he  had  grown,  and  he  was  gravely  pleased  with 
the  thought.  After  all,  it  would  seem  that  those 
sterile  months  had  not  been  empty  of  good. 

Towards  mid- July  he  was  busy  with  his  last 

chapter,  and  was  looking  forward  to  a  reading  and 

revision  of  the  whole,  for  it  was  his  custom  never  to 

read  his  work,  however  long  it  was,  until  it  had 

'6  233 


A   STUMBLING-BLOCK 

been  completed.  Then  he  went  over  it  with  some 
thing  like  a  fresh  eye,  and  made  little  changes  here 
and  there.  But  at  this  point  a  letter  came  from 
Violet,  posted  in  Paris.  It  said  that  she  had  left  the 
others  of  the  party,  and  was  returning  to  New  York 
on  the  steamer  from  Cherbourg  following  that  which 
would  bear  her  letter.  It  said  further  that  she  was 
bored  to  extinction  with  yachting,  and  was  home 
sick  for  her  husband  —  there  David's  eyebrows 
went  up  the  fraction  of  an  inch — and  asked  him  to 
meet  her  upon  her  arrival  in  New  York,  and  to 
make  some  arrangements  for  them  for  August  and 
September. 

David  hurried  his  final  chapter  to  its  conclusion 
and  went  to  New  York,  taking  the  manuscript  with 
him.  The  matter  of  revision  could  be  attended  to 
anywhere  and  under  almost  any  circumstances, 
since  its  nature  was  rather  purely  critical  and  not 
creative. 

He  found  old  Mrs.  Hawtrey  in  town  for  a  hurried 
day  or  two  between  two  visits — one  at  Newport  and 
the  other  in  the  Adirondacks.  She  also  had  re 
ceived  a  letter  from  Violet  announcing  her  imme 
diate  return  to  America,  and  she  offered  David  the 
house  in  Sixty-seventh  Street  for  as  long  as  he  and 
his  wife  might  care  to  remain  in  New  York  before 
making  their  plans  for  the  rest  of  the  hot  weather. 
David  accepted  gladly,  for  he  was  at  a  loss  as  to 
what  arrangements  to  make  for  August  and  Sep 
tember,  and  had  determined  to  await  his  wife's 
arrival  before  settling  upon  anything. 

234 


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He  found  out  when  Violet's  ship  was  to  arrive, 
and  went  down  to  the  North  River  pier  to  meet  her. 
Then,  when  her  luggage  had  been  cleared  through 
the  customs,  the  two  drove  up-town  together  in  a 
hansom.  It  seemed  to  David  that  his  wife  was 
looking  in  much  better  health  than  when  she  went 
away,  and  he  spoke  of  it  to  her.  She  said  yes,  she 
was  rather  better,  that  the  sea  air  always  made  her 
sleep  like  a  child,  but  that  she  had  found  herself 
bored  with  the  lazy  sailing  about  in  familiar  waters. 

"Also  I  missed  you,  David,"  she  said.  "  I  missed 
you  astonishingly,  much  more  than  I  had  expected 
to  do.  You're  far  nicer  than  other  people,  you 
know." 

She  asked  about  the  book  he  had  been  doing, 
and  he  told  her  that  it  was  barely  completed. 

"I  haven't  even  read  it  over  yet,"  he  said.  "I 
never  do,  you  know,  until  the  thing's  done.  If  this 
fairly  cool  weather  holds  I  should  like  to  stop  in 
town  for  a  week  and  go  over  the  thing.  Then  I 
could  leave  it  with  the  publishers  when  we  go  away 
and  be  quite  free  of  it." 

"Ah,  that  will  be  a  very  good  plan!"  she  answered. 
"Yes,  by  all  means,  David,  dear,  keep  at  it  now 
while  your  interest  is  fresh.  Never  mind  where  we 
are  to  go,  later  on,  or  when.  I  —  David,  I've 
thought  a  great  deal  about  the  book,  this  summer. 
I've  been  glad  that  I  went  away  and  left  you  to  it. 
Oh,  I  mean  it!  I'm  quite  serious.  I've  been  glad, 
though  I  wanted  to  have  you  near  me.  I  mustn't 
come  between  you  and  your  work,  David.  I  will 

235 


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not!  I  was  a  selfish  brute  about  it  last  winter, 
but — I  was  very  nervous,  and  I  didn't  realize  what 
I  was  doing.  There's  greatness  in  you,  as  I  used 
so  often  to  say,  and  I  want  to  help  it  on,  not  to 
smother  it.  I  mustn't  be  a  stumbling-block  to  you, 
David.  Is  it  good,  the  new  book  ?  Are  you  pleased 
with  it?  Oh,  I  hope  so!  I  hope  so!  If  it's  a  fine, 
strong  thing  it  will  make  up  to  you  all  your  disap 
pointment  and  worry  of  last  winter.  Do  you  think 
it's  good?" 

" Oh,  I  think  it's  good,"  said  David.  "  Good  for 
me,  that  is!  It's  a  bit  more  serious  than  what  has 
gone  before.  Yes,  I  think  it's  good.  It  ought  to 
be.  I've  worked  harder  and  more  faithfully  over 
it  than  over  anything  I  ever  did.  If  work  counts 
for  anything  this  book  should  mean  another  rung 
of  the  ladder."  He  gave  a  little  deprecatory  laugh, 
but  Violet,  as  if  the  phrase  had  brought  to  her  an 
old  scene,  put  out  her  hand  to  his  arm. 

"  I  want  you  to  climb  them  all,  David!"  she  said, 
as  she  had  said  to  him  in  the  theatre  in  London. 
"I  want  you  to  climb  them  all — to  the  very  top!" 

It  was  late  in  the  afternoon  when  they  reached 
Sixty-seventh  Street,  and  the  house  seemed  very 
dim  and  deserted  and  well-nigh  uninhabitable,  with 
its  shrouded  furniture  and  its  musty,  tomblike  air, 
so  they  waited  only  to  dress  and  then  hurried  away 
to  one  of  the  big  restaurants,  where  they  dined  in 
cool  and  leisurely  comfort,  surrounded  by  that  odd 
out-of-the-season  throng  which  springs  up  from 
somewhere  to  take  possession  of  New  York's  public 

236 


A   STUMBLING-BLOCK 

places  in  the  mid-summer  interval — garish  theatri 
cal  or  commercial  ladies  in  translucent  "shirt 
waists,"  and  racing  gentlemen  with  hard,  alert 
faces  and  no  waistcoats.  Afterwards  they  went 
on  to  one  of  the  roof -garden  shows,  a  form  of  enter 
tainment  quite  new  and  altogether  delightful  to 
them,  for  neither  had  ever  been  in  town  at  this 
time  of  the  year. 

On  the  following  morning  David  got  at  once  to 
his  task,  and  Violet  saw  to  her  unpacking  and  gave 
thought  to  several  plans  for  the  following  two  or 
three  months.  She  looked  in  upon  her  husband 
somewhat  after  one,  meaning  to  rouse  him  for 
lunch,  but  David,  sitting  within  a  circle  of  closely 
written  sheets  of  paper,  turned  an  absent  and 
frowning  eye  upon  her  and  she  fled.  She  had  a 
tray  of  things  prepared  and  quietly  set  just  inside 
his  door,  lunched  alone,  and  went  back  to  her 
devices. 

She  did  not  go  near  him  again  for  some  hours, 
but,  after  six  o'clock,  thinking  that  he  must  have 
lost  all  sense  of  time,  went  to  his  door  and  listened 
outside  it.  There  was  no  sound,  and  after  a  little 
while  she  opened  the  door  very  gently  and  went  in. 

David  sat  by  the  fireplace,  bent  forward  in  a 
crouching  posture,  his  elbows  on  his  knees.  His 
hands  hung  lax  before  him,  and  a  brass  poker 
dropped  from  them.  A  great  heap  of  burned 
papers  filled  the  grate  and  overflowed  upon  the 
tiles  before  it.  The  heart  of  them  still  glowed  red, 
and  now  and  then  a  belated  little  tongue  of  flame 

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leaped  up  from  the  mass  and  seemed  to  laugh — a 
grinning,  silent  laugh. 

The  woman  dropped  back  against  the  door- 
casing,  and  the  door  snapped  to  behind  her.  She 
put  up  her  hands  to  her  throat  as  if  a  sudden  pain 
had  stabbed  her  there.  Presently  she  said: 

"David — David!"  in  a  dry  whisper. 

David  turned  his  head,  still  crouching  over  the 
poker  and  the  smoldering  fire.  A  wry,  bitter  smile 
came  to  his  lips  and  contorted  his  face  very  oddly. 

"Ah,  Violet!  You?"  he  said.  He  lifted  the  brass 
poker  and  its  point  dropped  again,  clanging  upon 
the  tiles.  "I'm — saving  Cowper — some  trouble," 
he  said,  through  that  twisted  smile.  "It's  my — 
turn." 

"David — David!"  whispered  the  woman  by  the 
door,  her  two  hands  pressed  against  her  throat. 

"  Eh  ?"  said  he.  ' '  What  ?  Oh  yes,  it  was  bad— 
oh,  damned  bad!  It  was  so  bad  that  you'd  have 
laughed  over  it — shrieked.  It  was  the  grayest, 
dreariest,  most  utterly  uninspired  rot — rot!  I  ever 
in  my  life  have  read.  You'd  have  laughed  over  it 
— shrieked!"  He  laughed  himself,  a  cackling, 
tittering  laugh,  like  a  toothless  old  man.  "Lord, 
how  bad  it  was!"  said  he,  and  began  to  laugh 
again  horribly,  helplessly,  as  if  he  never  would  have 
done. 

The  woman  by  the  door  cried  out,  and  came 
swiftly  across  the  room  to  him.  She  caught  his 
head  in  her  arms  and  held  it  against  her,  standing 
beside  his  chair.  She  was  white  as  death  and 

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beyond  tears  or  sobbing  or  such.  Even  her  arms 
round  the  man's  head  did  not  tremble.  But  pres 
ently  he  pushed  her  away  from  him  and  got  to  his 
feet.  The  poker  dropped  from  his  hands,  clattering 
upon  the  tiles.  He  walked  blindly  across  to  the 
windows  and  part  of  the  way  back,  and  once  or 
twice  he  raised  his  hands  a  little  way  as  if  to  wring 
them  together  or  to  gesture  with  them,  but  they 
fell  nerveless  at  his  side.  Violet  stood  dumb  before 
the  fireplace. 

"What  is  the  matter?"  he  cried  out,  at  last;  the 
words  burst  from  him  with  sudden  violence.  "  For 
God's  sake,  what  is  the  matter?"  He  pointed  an 
uncertain  hand  towards  the  charred  and  crisping 
ashes.  "That — was  hopeless!"  he  said.  "Not — 
one — spark  of  the  fire  in  it.  It  read  like  a — text 
book.  For  God's  sake,  what  is  the  matter?  Have 
I  gone  mad?  Has  my  brain  utterly  failed  me?" 
His  eyes  went  wide  with  sudden  terror — like  a 
child's  eyes.  "What  is  the  matter?"  he  said,  still 
again,  and  he  began  to  shake  from  head  to  foot. 

"I  am  the  matter,  David,"  said  the  woman,  very 
slowly.  There  w^as  no  beat  of  emotion  in  her  tone, 
only  a  vast  and  still  despair  too  great  to  be  told. 
"It  is  /,  /,"  she  said.  "I  took  you  in  your  youth 
and  enthusiasm  and  high  hopes  and  great  prospects, 
when  you  were  giving  to  the  world  the  beauty  and 
delight  and  sweetness  that  were  in  you,  I  took  you 
away  because  I  desperately  wanted  all  these  things 
for  myself.  I  was  more  selfish  than  I  should  think 
any  sane  human  being  could  be.  I  thought  that 

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you  alone  of  all  people  could  work  a  miracle  with 
me,  make  me  like  yourself.  So  I  married  you,  and 
— this  is  what  I  have  done"  She  gave  a  single, 
hard- wrung  sob.  "I  have  robbed  you  of  all  that, 
and  it  has  turned  to  ashes  in  my  hands.  I  have 
robbed  you  of  all  you  had  and  I  have  gained  noth 
ing.  Oh,  David,  I  am  just  what  I  prayed  yester 
day  I  should  never  become — a  stumbling-block  to 
you.  I  have  wrecked  you,  David.  They  were 
right,  all  those  others,  and  I  was  wrong.  They  said 
I  would  wreck  you — or  their  faces  and  their  eyes 
said  it.  My  aunt  said  it  once,  outright.  She  said, 
'  Shipwreck  will  come  of  it,'  and  she  was  wise.  She 
knew.  But  I  would  not  listen.  Now  I'm  wise 
also — wise  when  it's  too  late."  She  moved  across 
the  room  to  where  he  stood,  twisting  his  hands  to 
gether  before  him.  His  eyes  stared  dully.  It  is 
doubtful  if  he  heard  her  at  all.  She  laid  her  hands 
upon  his  shoulders  and  looked  up  to  him,  whitely. 
"Have  I  wrecked  you  forever,  my  dear?"  she  said. 
"Will  it  never  come  back  to  you — the  light  I  took 
away?"  Her  voice  rose  to  a  sudden  agonized  cry. 
' '  Oh,  that  cannot  be  possible ! ' '  she  said.  ' '  There  is 
no  God  so  cruel  that  He  would  let  a  half-crazed 
woman  wreck  and  blight  such  a  man  as  you  are 
beyond  recovery.  I  will  not  believe  it.  It  will 
come  back,  David.  It  will!  It  must  come  back!" 
In  her  eagerness  she  shook  him  with  her  two  hands, 
staring  into  his  face,  and  David's  dull  eyes  met  hers 
with  an  effort. 

"I — I'm  afraid,  dear,"  said  he,  calling  up  a  thin, 
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A   STUMBLING-BLOCK 

vague  smile.  "I'm  afraid  I  haven't — heard  quite 
all  you've  been  saying.  I'm  sorry!  This  thing  has 
been  rather  a  facer.  You  see — you  see,  I  didn't 
expect  it.  I  thought  it  was — good.  Yes,  a  facer! 
Never  mind!  we'll  pull  up,  somehow.  I  expect  it 
doesn't  really  matter  much.  Lots  of  people —  No, 
it  doesn't  matter. "  He  put  up  his  arms  around  her 
shoulders,  staring  beyond  her  at  that  great  heap  of 
black  ashes  on  the  hearth;  but,  as  if  he  had  for 
gotten,  they  fell  away  again  and  dropped  beside 
him.  He  gave  a  little,  tired  sigh.  "If  you  don't 
mind,"  said  he,  "  I — should  like — to  be  left  alone  for 
awhile.  I  think  I  'm  fagged  out.  I  '11 — come  to  you 
later.  Just  a  little  while!" 

"Yes,  David,"  she  said,  very  quietly.  "Yes,  I'll 
go.  We  will  talk  it  all  over,  later  on,  when  you're 
rested.  I'll  go  now."  After  a  moment's  hesitation 
she  leaned  towards  him  and  kissed  his  cheek.  Then 
she  slipped  away  out  of  the  room. 

Two  hours  later,  anxious  because  he  had  had 
nothing  to  eat,  she  came  again  and  looked  in  upon 
him.  The  room  was  gray  with  the  twilight — dark 
ness  glooming  in  the  far  corners.  David  sat  again 
before  the  dead  black  ashes  of  his  work,  huddled  in 
his  chair,  his  head  bowed,  the  brass  poker  dropping 
from  his  lax  hands.  And  round  him  the  shadows 
were  gathering. 

Violet  gave  a  still  sob  and  went  away,  leaving 
him  there  alone  in  his  shadows. 


CHAPTER  XXII 

THREE  days  after  this,  old  Mrs.  Hawtrey,  who 
was  staying  with  friends  at  one  of  those  de 
lightful  summer  places  on  Upper  St.  Regis,  which 
are  modestly  called  "camps,"  received  a  telegram 
from  her  niece  in  New  York.     The  message  said : 

"David  ill  in  Doctor  Parkman's  private  hospital; 
typhoid;  mild  case;  I  remain  in  house.   VIOLET." 

Mrs.  Hawtrey  immediately  wired  an  inquiry  as 
to  whether  her  niece  would  like  to'  have  her  return 
to  town  to  bear  her  company,  but  Violet  replied 
begging  her  to  remain  where  she  was,  as  she  could 
be  of  no  service  in  New  York.  She  followed  this 
with  a  letter  explaining  that  David  had  been 
stricken  rather  suddenly  after  a  day's  hard  work, 
and  was  very  ill,  but,  if  the  doctors  and  nurses  were 
telling  the  truth,  was  in  no  danger*  She  asked  per 
mission  to  stay  on  indefinitely  at  the  house  in  Sixty- 
seventh  Street,  since  they  did  not  wish  her  to  live 
at  the  hospital  not  far  away.  "They  tell  me  that 
it  would  be  bad  for  David,"  she  said,  "  and  too  try 
ing  for  me.  Indeed,  they  won't  let  me  see  him  at 
all  just  now.  I  don't  know  why,  but  I  suppose 
they  have  their  reasons." 

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They  had.  David,  in  his  delirium,  talked  fluently 
and  with  great  frankness.  The  celebrated  head  of 
the  little  hospital  listened  for  a  few  moments  and 
then  conferred  with  his  subordinates. 

"What  is  Mrs. — ah — Rivers's  name?"  he  in 
quired.  " Does  any  one  know?"  No  one  did;  but 
during  the  morning  Violet  called,  and  the  director 
met  her  in  his  office.  He  seemed  to  have  been  a 
gentleman  of  resource.  He  produced  an  important 
looking  document  which  he  referred  to  casually  as 
having  something  to  do  with  the  Board  of  Health, 
and  asked  Mrs.  Rivers  to  sign  it.  He  said  it  was 
only  a  necessary  bit  of  red-tape.  Violet  signed  it, 
and  the  physician  lifted  his  eyebrows  very  slightly 
over  the  name. 

"Your  husband,  madam,"  he  said,  with  profes 
sional  cheerfulness,  "is  doing  well — very  well  indeed ; 
but  we  make  it  a  rule  at  this  early  stage  of  the 
disease  to  allow  no  one  to  see  a  patient.  The  effect 
is  sometimes — ah — disturbing.  Yes,  disturbing. 
You  must  trust  us  entirely.  We  do  not  wish  to  be 
unkind,  but  in  fevers,  you  understand?  Quite  so! 
Quite  so!" 

"Is  he  delirious?"  she  asked. 

"He  babbles  of  green  fields, madam, "replied  the 
man  of  medicine,  "and — er — various  other  cheerful 
subjects." 

Violet  smiled  with  some  relief. 

"Ah,  then  he's  happy,"  said  she.  "He's  quite 
happy.  I  mustn't  disturb  him.  I'll  come  every 
morning  and  evening  for  news,  and — if  he  should 

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grow — worse —  She  set  her  lips  very  tight  to 
gether,  looking  across  into  the  smug  face  of  the 
directing  physician,  and  the  blue  shadows  round 
her  eyes  seemed  to  darken  a  bit. 

"We  should  inform  you  at  once,"  the  man  prom 
ised.  "At  once!  But  I  have  no  fears  whatever. 
The  case  is  not  a  severe  one.  It  will  doubtless  run 
a  brief  and  satisfactory  course."  He  bowed  his 
visitor  out,  and  presently  went  to  the  room  where 
a  calm  and  quiet  woman  in  white  and  gray  stood 
over  a  bed,  and  the  man  on  the  bed  blissfully  con 
versed  with  a  lady,  addressing  her  by  name.  The 
nurse  looked  up,  and  her  superior's  eyebrows 
beckoned  her  across  the  room. 

"Mrs.  Rivers's  name,"  announced  the  physician, 
"is  Violet."  The  nurse  hid  a  slight  smile,  and  mur 
mured  : 

"Oh!" 

"In  which  case,"  he  continued,  "it  seemed  best 
to  me  to  make  a  rule  that  she  should  not  see  her 
husband  until  the  delirium  is — er — past.  Yes. 
Quite  so!  I  shall  report  to  her  daily  upon  the 
case." 

The  man  on  the  bed  called  out  loudly  a  name 
which  was  not  Violet,  and  the  nurse  turned  back 
to  him.  The  head  of  the  institution  returned  to 
his  office  nodding  a  sage  head. 

"  It  is  very  remarkable,"  he  whispered  to  himself, 
"very  remarkable,  indeed,  how  seldom  they  men 
tion  the  names  of  their  wives  when  they  are 
delirious.  Yes,  very  remarkable,  indeed!" 

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The  case  proved  to  be,  as  the  doctor  had  prophe 
sied,  a  mild  one,  and  it  ran  its  course  without  acci 
dent  or  relapse;  but  the  following  stage  of  con 
valescence  was  prolonged  beyond  all  apparent 
reason.  Everything  seemed  favorable  to  a  quick 
recovery,  but  the  gain  of  strength  was  inordinately 
slow. 

"  I  confess  to  being  a  little  puzzled,"  the  director 
said  to  Violet  Rivers — "a  little  puzzled.  Your 
husband  shows  evidence  of  a  sound  and  rather 
powerful  vitality,  but — he  does  not  pick  up  as  he 
should.  The  desire  for  recovery  seems  oddly 
lacking." 

Inwardly  he  was  saying:  "If  we  only  had  the 
lady  with  the  pretty  name  here!  He'd  be  up  and 
about  fast  enough  then,  I'll  take  oath!" 

Mrs.  Rivers's  face  turned  black. 

"Yes,  I — see,"  she  murmured,  very  low.  "lam 
afraid  that  is  true. ' '  And  the  man  of  medicine  found 
himself  wondering  if  she  knew  anything  about  the 
lady  with  the  pretty  name. 

September  was  drawing  to  its  close  before  the 
invalid  was  pronounced  fit  to  leave  the  hospital. 
At  that  he  was  but  a  pallid  wreck  of  the  old  David, 
and  his  knees  wobbled  under  him  most  distressfully 
when  he  tried  to  get  about  on  them.  But  Violet 
took  him  off  at  once  into  the  country;  not  to  the 
Farings'  place  in  Connecticut — she  had  a  trust 
worthy  instinct  against  that;  but  to  the  house  of 
an  old  friend  in  Baychester.  And  there  he  seemed 
to  gain  much  more  rapidly,  spending  all  the  day 

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A    STUMBLING-BLOCK 

in  the  open,  either  on  land  or  on  water,  until  by  the 
time  the  chill  of  late  October  drove  them  back  into 
town  he  was  once  more  fairly  strong. 

"But  oh,  he's  not  David!"  Violet  complained  to 
Beatrix  Faring.  "He's  only  the  shell  of  David. 
Where  has  the  spirit  of  him  gone?  He's  reasona 
bly  well,  but  he  creeps  about  like  a  sick  man — like 
a  man  in  a  dream."  And  at  another  time  she  broke 
out,  in  a  sort  of  agony :  "  I  ask  questions,  but  I  know 
— I  know  quite  well.  He's  afraid.  He  remembers  and 
he's  afraid.  The — light  hasn't  come  back  to  him, 
and  so  he  doesn't  want  to  live  any  more.  Oh, 
what  can  I  do  to  save  David?  I  must  save  him 
somehow!" 

In  November  she  persuaded  him  to  go  abroad. 
A  recent  circumstance  had  pleased  and  somewhat 
cheered  him,  though  it  put  no  heart  into  him  for 
the  future.  The  story  which,  a  year  before,  he 
had  gone  to  France  to  write,  and  which  had  been 
running  as  a  serial  in  one  of  the  magazines,  was 
published  late  in  September  and  was  an  immediate 
success  both  with  critics  and  public.  The  critics, 
for  the  most  part,  said  that  it  showed  a  very  con 
siderable  growth  towards  maturity,  without  the 
sacrifice  of  the  peculiar  idyllic  charm  which  Mr. 
Rivers  had  made  his  own,  and  the  public  seemed 
to  think  something  of  the  kind  also,  for  it  bought 
the  book  in  flattering  numbers,  and  the  name  even 
appeared  for  a  brief  while  on  that  roll  of  infamy, 
the  list  of  the  Six  Best  Sellers. 

So  David  departed,  a  person  of  some  small 
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celebrity,  with  his  photographs  in  the  literary 
monthlies  and  the  name  of  his  book  writ  large  and 
black  to  both  right  and  left  wherever  there  are 
advertisements. 

He  said  little  about  it ;  indeed,  he  said  little  about 
anything  in  these  days,  but  it  was  evident  that  he 
felt  some  pleasure  and  went  away  with  an  increase 
of  good  spirits. 

They  went  first  to  Paris,  but  it  was  cold  and 
rainy  there,  and  so,  after  a  fortnight,  they  turned 
south  to  Cannes  and  Mentone,  and  later  to  Rome. 
David  had  an  odd  little  experience  in  Paris  which 
seemed  to  remain  in  his  memory  for  a  long  time 
and  to  trouble  him. 

They  were  in  a  victoria,  driving  up  the  Champs 
Elyse"es,  one  afternoon,  when,  just  past  the  Rond 
Pointe,  David  gave  a  sudden  exclamation  and  half 
rose  in  his  seat,  staring  out  to  one  side.  Violet 
asked  him  what  was  the  matter,  and  he  answered, 
obviously  in  some  excitement,  that  some  one  he 
had  known  a  long  time  before  had  just  passed  in  a 
fiacre. 

"  In  that  fiacre  with  the  white  horse,"  he  said. 

"A white  horse?"  she  questioned.  "Why,  I  was 
looking  to  that  side,  and  I  saw  no  fiacre  with  a  white 
horse.  Are  you  sure?" 

David  turned  his  face  towards  her  slowly.  His 
eyes  were  shadowy  and  inscrutable. 

"Have  I,  then,  begun  to  see  her — to  see  things 
that  do  not  exist — in  the  broad  daylight?"  he  mut 
tered,  in  a  slow  voice.  "Have  I  come  to  that?" 

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"Look  back,"  said  Violet.  "We  are  going  slow 
ly.  I  may  be  wrong  about  it.  There  may  have 
been  such  a  -fiacre  with  such  a  horse."  David  hesi 
tated,  but,  after  a  moment,  turned  in  his  seat  and 
scanned  the  crowded  roadway  behind  them.  When 
he  resumed  his  position  his  face  was  pale  and  looked 
oddly  gaunt.  He  did  not  speak,  and  his  wife  did 
not  question  him,  for  she  was  learning  wisdom. 
But  long  afterwards  he  spoke  of  the  occurrence 
more  than  once,  and  she  saw  that  he  was  worried 
about  it. 

From  Rome  they  went  to  Algiers  for  a  month, 
but  returned  for  Easter  week,  and,  late  in  April, 
went  to  Venice,  but  the  wandering  and  the  idleness 
seemed  to  work  very  little  change  in  the  invalid. 
He  remained,  through  all  changes  of  scene,  what 
Violet  had  called  him  to  Beatrix  Faring,  "  the  shell 
of  David — a  man  in  a  dream."  He  made  no  at 
tempt  to  work,  and  never  spoke  of  any  such  inten 
tion.  Assuredly  something  had  gone  out  of  him. 
Violet,  on  her  knees  in  the  dark,  wrestling  with 
unfamiliar  prayer,  cried  upon  God,  asking  if  it 
would  never  come  back,  if  David  was  to  walk  in 
darkness  all  the  rest  of  his  life. 

At  mid-May  she  appealed  to  him. 

"David,  what  shall  we  do  for  you?"  she  begged. 
"  What  can  we  do  ?  You  grow  no  better.  There's 
no  spirit  in  you.  You  don't  care  for  anything.  I 
shall  die  if  I  cannot  help  you  somehow.  What 
would  you  like  to  do,  or  where  would  you  like  to 
go?" 

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David  raised  dull  eyes  to  her  and  a  thin,  absent 
smile.  After  a  moment  a  faint  light  seemed  to 
come  to  the  eyes  and  a  faint  touch  of  color  to  his 
cheeks. 

"I  believe  I  should  like  to  go  to — Croydon,"  he 
answered.  "Little  old  Croydon,  where  I  was  born. 
I  don't  know  why,  but  I  think  I  should  like  to 
go  there.  There  is  a  certain  damp,  sweet,  mossy 
smell  in  Main  Street  under  the  maples  that  I  want 
to  smell  again.  Croydon!"  he  said,  and  the  little, 
absent  smile  changed  and  deepened.  "Croydon! 
By  Jove,  I  'd  like  to  go  to  Croydon !  I  think  I  should 
be — better  there.  Little  green  old  Croydon!  Little 
Croydon,  with  the  white  houses  and  the  green  shut 
ters  and  the  syringas  in  the  front  yards,  and  the 
bridge  that  sounds  as  if  a  thunder-storm  were  com 
ing  up  when  you  drive  across  it.  And  the  maples  ! 
— the  great,  green,  high-arched  maples!  Little 
Croydon!  Little  old  Croydon!  By  Jove,  I  want 
to  go  there  and  be  made — a  boy  again!" 
17 


CHAPTER   XXIII 

VIOLET  RIVERS  sat  on  the  front  porch  steps 
of  the  old  Rivers  place  in  Croydon,  and  the 
sweet  June  morning  air  stirred  round  her  and 
brought  her  exquisite  little  smells  of  earth  and 
dew-wet  grass  and  flowers  agrowing.  The  leaves 
of  the  great  maples  sighed  overhead,  and  the  flecks 
of  sunlight  which  pierced  them  shivered  and  danced 
about  the  woman's  feet  like  live  golden  things  play 
ing.  She  had  gathered  a  great  handful  of  lilies-of- 
the-valley  from  the  row  of  them  which  grew  along 
the  edge  of  the  porch  close  against  the  roots  of  the 
ivy  and  myrtle  that  spread,  above,  into  an  inter 
woven  screen,  and  she  was  making  of  them  a  cluster 
to  wear. 

A  small  child,  in  a  very  short,  pink  frock,  passed 
down  the  shaded  street  singing  an  absurd  little 
nursery  song  about  a  queen  who  was  in  her  parlor 
eating  bread  and  honey,  as  all  proper  queens  should 
do,  and  Mrs.  Rivers  raised  her  head  to  watch  it  go. 
The  peace  of  this  sheltered  back  water,  the  still, 
green  quaintness  of  it,  appealed  to  her  sense  of  the 
picturesque  as  a  painting  might  have  done,  or  a 
poem.  It  was  something  new  to  her,  and  she  smiled 
over  it,  as  her  fingers  kissed  themselves  with  the 

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little  flowers,  thinking  how  pretty  it  was  to  look  at 
and  how  unendurable  it  would  be  to  live  in.  She 
tried  to  imagine  the  state  of  a  being  with  any  nerves 
at  all,  or  even  with  a  moderate  interest  in  the 
world's  activity,  after  a  burial  of  six  months,  or 
three,  or  two,  in  such  a  place,  and  she  decided  that 
the  people  who  lived  here  must  be  entirely  without 
nerves  and  without  the  common  human  interests. 
The  soul  of  Croydon,  the  tender,  untroubled  con 
tent  of  this  rest  close  to  nature's  heart,  escaped  her 
altogether.  One  must  be  born  to  that.  It  cannot 
be  acquired. 

She  finished  making  the  little  cluster  of  lilies-of- 
the-valley,  thrust  it  into  her  girdle,  and  moved  out 
along  the  narrow,  flagged  walk  between  tall  snow 
ball  bushes  to  the  gate.  She  leaned  her  arms  upon 
the  gate's  top  and  looked  idly  down  the  long  street, 
thinking  that  David  might  be  returning.  He  had 
gone  "down-town"  (she  smiled  over  the  phrase)  an 
hour  before,  to  see  if  old  McCann,  the  fishmonger, 
was  still  alive  in  his  tiny  shop  near  the  bridge,  and 
to  find  out  if  they  remembered  him  at  the  Eagle 
Hotel  and  at  Medical  Hall  and  at  Busch's.  The 
street  was  as  still  and  peaceful,  almost  as  empty, 
as  a  country  lane.  Violet  pushed  open  the  gate 
and  went  out.  She  turned  up  instead  of  down, 
and  strolled  slowly  along  under  the  great  green 
arch,  those  restless  golden  sunflecks  dancing  about 
her  feet. 

A  butcher's  boy,  in  a  soiled  apron,  basket  on  arm, 
passed  her  and  turned  to  stare,  the  lady  was  so 


A   STUMBLING-BLOCK 

obviously  not  of  Croydon.  A  young  woman  in 
white,  without  a  hat,  crossed  the  street  a  little 
before,  making  for  a  gate  which  led  to  a  square, 
white  house  half  hidden  behind  greenery.  The  girl 
had  to  pause  a  moment  to  allow  Mrs.  Rivers  to  pass 
before  she  could  approach  the  gate,  or  else  rudely 
cross  directly  before  her,  and  Violet  acknowledged 
the  courtesy  with  a  little  bow  and  passed  on.  But 
as  she  went  their  eyes  met  in  a  moment's  glance, 
and  the  elder  woman  gave  an  involuntary  exclama 
tion  under  her  breath,  an  exclamation  of  sheer 
astonishment  and  delight,  for  she  thought  that  she 
had  never  in  all  her  life  seen  any  one  so  beautiful. 
She  had  not  known  that  such  splendid  beauty  could 
exist  in  the  flesh.  She  turned,  after  she  had  gone 
a  few  steps,  to  look  back.  The  girl  stood  inside  the 
gate,  gazing  gravely  after  the  stranger  who  had 
passed,  and  Violet,  as  their  eyes  met  for  the  second 
time,  flushed  slightly  and  went  on  her  way.  She 
was  full  of  a  keen  excitement  over  her  discovery, 
and  of  wonder  that  such  a  being  should  be  hidden 
here  in  this  remote  and  forgotten  corner  of  the 
world. 

"There  is  no  one  like  her!"  she  said,  emphati 
cally.  "There  is  no  one  like  her  anywhere,  except 
in  marble  in  the  museums,  and  they  are  only  white, 
frozen  shadows  of  her.  They  haven't  her  wonder 
ful  color.  Ah!"  She  gave  another  sudden  excla 
mation,  nodding  her  head.  "The  marbles  in  the 
museums!  That's  it!  That  was  what  seemed  so 
oddly  familiar  and  so  puzzling.  She's  Greek,  pure 

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Greek,  that  girl.  She's  Phryne,  Artemis,  Helen, 
when  Helen  was  young.  She's  all  the  beautiful, 
perfect  things  the  Greeks  dreamed  of  and  couldn't 
reproduce  because  marble  is  white.  What  a  golden 
beauty!  I  must  find  out  who  she  is." 

She  passed  a  house  more  pretentious  than  its 
neighbors,  a  house  with  turrets  and  mansard-roofs 
and  ornamental  iron  scrolls,  all  set  among  exotic 
trees  behind  a  fence  of  atrociously  elaborate  iron 
casting.  From  what  David  had  told  her  she  knew 
that  this  must  be  Robert  Henley's  place,  and  she 
glanced  curiously  in  at  it,  over  the  dreadful  fence, 
wondering  where  its  fierce  and  eccentric  master 
was  at  that  moment. 

An  old  man  in  a  very  long  and  wrinkled  frock- 
coat  and  an  ill-preserved  top-hat  came  shambling 
along  the  street  towards  her — a  quaint  old  man, 
but  scarcely  attractive.  He  was  very  much  bent 
at  the  shoulders,  and  with  each  step  he  tapped 
heavily  upon  the  flag-stones  with  a  gold-headed 
stick.  He  had  a  lean,  furrowed  face,  none  too  re 
cently  shaven,  and  his  gray  hair  was  unkempt, 
hanging  down  before  his  ears  and  upon  his  high 
coat-collar  behind.  No,  he  was  not  an  attractive 
old  man.  He  looked  rather  like  an  ancient  and 
battered  eagle  in  coat  and  hat. 

He  did  not  look  up  as  he  approached ;  his  pale, 
protruding  eyes  were  fixed,  as  if  in  a  state  of  hyp 
nosis,  upon  the  ground  a  little  ahead  of  his  feet; 
but  all  at  once  the  woman  recognized  him  and  cried 
out.  Robert  Henley  raised  his  bent  head,  sidewise, 

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like  a  bird,  to  regard  her.  She  saw  the  fierce  old 
eyes  sharpen  to  recognition,  and,  for  a  moment, 
stare.  She  saw  the  mouth  open  once  and  twice, 
and  shut  with  a  sort  of  click.  Then  the  man  struck 
his  cane  very  savagely  upon  the  flagstones  and 
turned  to  go  on  his  way. 

She  put  out  a  swift  hand  to  him,  saying : 

"Oh,  please!  please!"  And  once  more  the  old 
man  halted  and  raised  his  unkempt  head  to  face 
her,  grim,  silent,  implacable. 

"You — are  Mr.  Henley,  are  you  not?"  she  asked, 
in  a  quick,  breathless  tone,  her  hands  pressed  to 
gether  before  her. 

"I  am,  ma'am!"  replied  Robert  Henley. 

"I  am— Violet  Rivers,"  she  said,  "David's— 
wife."  The  old  face  was  suddenly  contorted,  but 
it  settled  again  into  its  grim,  hard  lines,  a  little 
whiter,  perhaps.  "We  never  met,  I  think,"  she 
went  on,  "but  I — saw  you  once — twice — in  New 
York.  Oh,  Mr.  Henley,  you've  got  to — forgive 
him  for  marrying  me!  You've  got  to  take  him 
back.  He's  ill ;  he  has  been  very,  very  ill,  and  he 
has  come  here  to  gain  strength  because — he  seems 
unable  to  gain  it  anywhere  else.  You've  got  to 
help  me  with  him.  You've  got  to!  I'm  desperate 
enough  to  beg  you,  who  are  a  stranger  to  me,  to 
do  it.  If  David  ever  in  his  life  needed  you,  he 
needs  you  now.  You've  got  to  take  him  back!" 

Old  Robert  Henley  began  to  tremble.  He  put 
up  an  uncertain  hand  to  his  dry  lips,  and  his  lips 
made  odd,  whispering  noises  behind  it. 

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"Your  husband,  ma'am,  made  his  own  choice," 
he  answered,  but  the  seamed  old  face  was  twisting 
once  more.  "  He  was  all  I  had,"  said  the  old  man, 
bitterly,  "and  he  deserted  me!" 

"  You  deserted  him!"  exclaimed  Violet  Rivers. 
"  And  now  he  is  ill  and  needs  you.  He  needs  you 
badly.  Oh,  I  must  talk  with  you  about  David.  I 
have  no  one  else  to  talk  with.  Can  you  not  come 
to  our  house?  Ah,  no!  David  will  be  returning 
soon.  Couldn't  I  go  to  yours?" 

"  No  woman  has  entered  my  house  in  twenty 
years,  ma'am,"  said  Robert  Henley. 

"Are  you  going  to  refuse  me  your  hospitality?" 
she  asked,  and  old  Robert's  eyes  fell  before  hers. 
He  turned  slowly  and  led  the  wray.  At  the  gate  he 
said: 

"  I  perhaps  should  warn  you  that  no  lady  of  this 
village  would  care  to  be  seen  entering  here." 

"I  shall  hope  to  enter  often,"  said  she,  "with  or 
without  my  husband."  And  the  man  turned  his 
head  away  so  that  his  face  was  hidden.  But  when 
he  had  climbed  the  half-dozen  steps  to  the  porch, 
and  stood  breathing  hard  at  their  top,  he  said, 
bowing : 

"I  thank  you,  ma'am!"  And,  rising  from  the 
bow,  he  seemed  a  very  little  to  straighten  his  bent, 
old  shoulders.  The  ancient  William,  white-pated 
now  and  tremulous,  opened  the  door  to  them,  and 
when  he  saw  the  lady  with  his  master  fell  back  a 
step,  lifting  his  two  hands.  It  is  probable  that  he 
thought  his  hour  had  come. 

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Robert  turned  upon  him  harshly. 

"Mind  your  manners,  you  scoundrel!"  he  ex 
claimed.  "My  hat  and  stick!  Open  the  library 
door!"  He  ushered  his  guest  into  the  big,  square 
room,  with  its  book-lined  walls  and  its  heavy  ma 
hogany  and  its  faint  scent  of  leather  and  of  sandal- 
wood. 

"Oh,  what  a  splendid  room!"  she  cried.  "What 
a  room  to  live  in!" 

"  It  has  been  my  home  for  many  years,  ma'am," 
said  old  Robert.  He  pulled  out  a  great  chair  of 
stuffed  leather  for  her,  and,  when  she  was  seated, 
placed  himself  opposite,  regarding  her  sombrely. 
There  was  a  spot  of  color  in  his  yellow  cheeks.  "  If 
you  will  be  so  good  " — and  the  woman  saw  that  his 
hands  shook  with  his  eagerness — "if  you  will  be  so 
good,  tell  me — of  David.  I  knew  from  the  papers 
that  he  had  been  ill.  You  say  he — needs  me !  How  ? 
What  is  the  matter  with  David  ?  Tell  me  quickly." 

So  David's  wife  set  in  to  tell  all  she  could  tell  of 
David's  fall  from  his  high  estate — of  the  strange 
lethargy  which  had  hung  upon  him  early  in  their 
marriage,  of  his  attempts  to  work  and. the  failure 
of  those  attempts,  of  the  burned  novel  and  his 
severe  illness,  finally  of  their  subsequent  wander 
ings  and  their  decision  to  come  to  Croydon  for  a 
visit. 

"If  this  can  do  nothing  for  him,"  she  said,  very 
sadly,  "then  I  shall  be  altogether  in  despair.  If 
this  cannot  waken  him  I  do  not  know  what  I  shall 
do,  for  I  shall  be  at  the  end  of  resource.  Oh,"  she 

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said,  "you  cannot  picture  or  imagine  my  agony 
over  it  all!  I  have  wrecked  and  spoiled  him.  It 
was  his  marrying  me  that  froze  him  into  this  stupor. 
I  do  not  try  to  hide  that  from  myself,  and  I  shall 
not  try  to  hide  it  from  you.  It  is  I  who  have 
wrecked  him." 

Old  Robert  Henley  gave  a  hoarse,  animal-like 
cry. 

"  I  warned  him!"  he  said,  very  bitterly.  "  Oh,  I 
warned  him  against  it!" 

"Against  me?"  she  asked.  "Yes,  I  knew  you 
had  disapproved  of  his  marrying,  and  had  cast  him 
off.  He  had  to  tell  me  that,  but  he  would  tell  me 
no  more.  You  warned  him  against  me?" 

Old  Robert  beat  shaking  hands  upon  the  arms 
of  his  chair.  Grief  and  rage  had  carried  him  be 
yond  himself. 

"I  said  to  him,"  he  cried — "I  said,  'She  is  a 
vampire,  David.  She  and  her  kind  are  vampires. 
She'll  cripple  you,  she'll  rob  you  of  your  youth 
and  strength,  your  enthusiasm  and  your  ambition, 
and  she'll  give  you  nothing  in  return.  She's  a 
vampire,'  I  said,  'and  you  bid  fair  to  prove  a  fool.' 
Oh,  I  warned  him!  I  saw  how  it  would  be.  I 
asked  him,  in  return  for  all  I  may  ever  have  done 
for  him,  to  give  you  up.  I  begged  him  to  do  that 
for  my  sake,  but  he — wouldn't.  He  wouldn't  do 
it." 

Violet  rose  quickly  and  moved  across  to  one  of 
the  windows — that  window  from  which  Robert 
Henley  had  slain  the  albatross — and  she  stood 

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there  with  her  back  towards  the  room.  But  pres 
ently  she  heard  the  old  man  stir  and  sigh  behind 
her,  and  she  turned  to  him  once  mpre.  Robert 
looked  up  to  her  miserably. 

"  I — cannot  sufficiently  apologize  for  my  words," 
said  he.  "I  have  insulted  a  lady  in  my  own  house. 
My — my  feeling  carried  me  away.  If  you  could 
pardon  me  for  that  great  rudeness,  ma'am,  I  should 
be  very  grateful.  I  am  not  quite  myself,  I  fear. 
This  hearing  of  David  again  after  so  long — " 

The  woman  smiled  down  upon  him  whitely. 

"  Oh,  I  do  not  feel  insulted,"  she  answered.  "  You 
have  done  me  no  wrong.  Indeed,  I  am  glad  to 
know — just  how  it  seemed — and  seems — to — some 
one  else.  Vampire?"  she  repeated,  slowly.  "That 
is  a  hard  word,  sir,  but  it  is  the  true  word.  That  is 
what  I  have  been  to  David — a  vampire.  I  mar 
ried  him  for  selfish  reasons,  for  what  I  thought 
he  could  bring  me,  not  for  what  I  hoped  to  bring 
him.  I  did  not  think  much  of  that  side  of  it,  save 
vaguely  that  we  were  congenial  and  that  we  should 
be  very,  very  happy  when  he  had  made  me  what 
he  was — fresh  and  strong  and  enthusiastic  and — 
believing.  Oh  yes,  I  have  been  a  vampire  to  him! 
That  is  the  true  word.  I  tried  to  steal  his  youth 
and  sweetness  for  myself,  but  when  I  had  robbed 
him  of  them  I  found  they  were  of  no  use  to  me. 
It  was  too  late." 

Old  Robert's  eyes  pierced  her  as  he  sat  sunken 
in  his  chair.  He  looked  more  than  ever  like  an 
ancient  and  battered  eagle,  and  the  woman  gave  a 

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wan,  momentary  smile  over  it  as  the  thought  came 
to  her. 

"You  didn't  even  love  David?"  he  asked. 

She  shook  a  slow  head. 

"I  loved  the  hope  of  happiness,"  she  told  him. 
"  I — thought  I  loved  David,  but — I  expect  it  was 
myself.  If  I  had  truly  loved  him,  I  expect  I  should 
have  known  that  I  could  bring  him  only  disap 
pointment  and  pain.  Oh,  I  have  brought  him  to 
shipwreck,  and  it  is  dark  and  I  cannot  see  ahead! 
I  don't  know  what  is  to  come  of  it!  Mr.  Henley, 
you  must  help  me  with  him.  Not  for  my  sake.  I 
ask  nothing  for  myself.  I  ask  it  for  David.  We 
must  heal  him  somehow  or  he  will  die.  He  cannot 
live  with  the  spirit  gone  out  of  him.  Tell  me  that 
you  will  help!" 

But  old  Robert  did  not  answer  her.  He  gave  no 
sign  even  of  hearing  what  she  said.  His  face  had 
settled  into  a  yellow  mask  scored  deep  with  lines 
and  furrows.  Out  of  it,  under  their  shaggy  brows, 
his  pale  eyes  stared  across  the  room. 

"And  I  sent  him  away  from  her!"  he  said,  very 
bitterly.  "I  took  him  from  her  to  the  end  that 
this  should  come  to  him!" 

The  woman's  eyes  sharpened. 

"  What  do  you  mean  ?"  she  asked.  "  From  whom 
did  you  take  him?" 

Old  Robert  looked  up  to  her. 

"Has  David  never  spoken  to  you  of  Rosemary 
Crewe?"  he  said.  Violet  drew  a  deep  breath. 

"No  —  no!"  she  answered,  in  a  whisper.     She 
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gave  a  sudden  exclamation.  "It  is  a  girl  here!" 
she  cried.  "You  sent  him  away  from  a  girl  here? 
It  must  be — the  one  I  saw  this  morning.  What 
is  she  like?" 

Old  Robert  dropped  his  head.  His  fingers  trem 
bled  and  played  among  the  things  on  the  writing- 
table  before  him. 

"She  is  as  beautiful,"  said  he,  "as  love,  and  as 
pitiful  as  sleep,  and  as  kind  as — forgetfulness.  And 
she  loved  him.  My  God,  she  loved  him!  And  I 
sent  him  away." 

Violet  Rivers  leaned  back  against  the  window- 
casing,  and  for  an  instant  she  put  up  her  two  hands 
over  her  eyes. 

"  It  is  the  girl — I  saw  this  morning,"  she  said  pres 
ently,  in  a  flat  voice. 

It  is  impossible,  within  the  space  of  a  few  months, 
to  eradicate  a  lifelong  habit.  The  woman's  first 
instinctive  thought  was  of  herself,  and  it  was  a 
swift  stab  of  jealousy.  David  must  have  loved 
that  wonderful  Greek  girl  with  the  sweet  eyes.  At 
some  time  he  must  have  loved  her,  and  now  he 
would  be  face  to  face  with  her  again.  What  chance 
had  his  wife  against  such  beauty  as  that?  What 
chance  had  any  wToman?  She  shook  her  head 
angrily  as  if  to  shake  the  thought  from  her,  and 
she  took  a  step  forward,  away  from  the  window, 
so  that  she  stood  over  the  old  man,  sunken  in  his 
chair. 

"If  that  is  true,"  said  she,  "if  once  you  took 
David  away  from  that  girl  whom  I  saw  to-day, 

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then  it  is  not  I  only  who  have  wrecked  him.  It  is 
you  as  well.  I  dare  say  your  motive  was  good — 
unselfish,  and  I  know  that  mine  was  bad — selfish; 
but  it's  the  result  we  have  to  face  now.  The 
motives  do  not  matter.  Between  us  we  have 
brought  him  to  this  pass,  and,  somehow,  between 
us  we  must  save  him.  I  don't  know  how.  As  I 
said  before,  it  is  dark  and  I  cannot  see  before  me. 
But  I  know  that  you  and  I,  somehow,  at  any  cost, 
must  save  David's  soul  alive." 

"Or  Rosemary  must  save  it,"  answered  the  old 
man,  nodding. 

Mrs.  Rivers  looked  down  at  him  for  a  long  time 
in  silence.  But  at  last  she  gave  an  odd  little  shiver. 

"Rosemary?"  she  said,  slowly.  "Rosemary? 
that's  for — remembrance." 


CHAPTER  XXIV 

MEANWHILE  David  came  up  from  his  quest 
among  the  village  fathers.  He  was  a  little 
hurt  in  his  feelings,  for  these  gentlemen  had  insisted 
upon  treating  him  with  ceremonious  respect;  one 
only,  out  of  them  all,  called  him  "  Davie,"  and  then 
blushed  and  apologized,  as  at  an  unpardonable 
solecism.  Old  Robert,  in  the  role  of  trumpeter, 
would  seem  to  have  done  for  his  ward.  He  asked 
the  little  knot  of  loungers  at  the  Eagle  Hotel  to 
come  to  the  bar  and  have  a  drink  with  him,  and 
they  followed  him  without  hesitation,  but  it  was 
a  melancholy  drink,  and  no  one  seemed  to  enjoy  it. 
Grandpa  Hawkins  added  the  last  funereal  touch  by 
saying  that  he  reckoned  the  little  "  taown  "  looked 
small  nowadays,  hey  ?  David  morosely  said  that  it 
looked  very  nice  indeed,  and  straightway  escaped. 
He  walked  up  the  street  cursing,  but  presently 
laughed. 

"  Oh,  I'll  make  'em  take  me  back  on  their  knees, 
yet!"  he  growled.  "They're  only  shy."  Then  he 
frowned  as  his  mind  turned  to  something  which 
one  of  the  men  had  told  him.  It  appeared  that 
old  Robert  Henley  had,  within  the  past  year  or 
two,  broken  with  tradition  and  was  going  down 

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hill — that  he  drank  much  and  irregularly  now, 
might  be  seen  at  any  time  with  his  hands  under  his 
coat-tails.  The  band  of  critics  opined  that  at  this 
pace  he  could  not  last  long,  and  speculated  as  to 
what  would  become  of  his  money  when  he  had 
taken  the  final  drink.  David  had  spent  many 
hours  of  both  day  and  night,  since  his  decision  to 
return  to  Croydon,  in  planning  the  means  by  which 
a  reconciliation  with  the  fierce  old  man  was  to  be 
accomplished.  He  had  invented  many  ingenious 
and  skilful  schemes  only  to  lay  them  aside,  one  by 
one,  and,  in  the  end,  to  shake  his  head  with  some 
thing  like  discouragement.  The  thing  was  like 
to  prove  wellnigh  impossible,  he  said  again  and 
again  to  his  wife,  and  they  agreed  finally  that  it 
must  be  left  to  chance. 

David  shook  his  head  once  more  as  he  walked 
slowly  up  Main  Street.  Old  Robert  had  broken 
the  ancient  law,  was  drinking  irregularly,  might  be 
seen  at  any  time  with  his  hands  under  his  coat- 
tails!  David  felt  a  keen  shame  that  was  scarcely 
vicarious,  that  was  almost  personal.  And  after  all, 
he  argued,  sadly,  was  it  not  personal?  But  for 
that  break  in  their  relation,  would  Robert  Henley 
now  be  a  mark  for  contemptuous  tongues  ? 

He  came  to  his  own  gate  and  went  in.  Violet 
was  not  on  the  porch  nor  within  the  house.  From 
an  upper  window  he  made  sure  that  she  was  not 
in  the  garden,  and  so  returned  to  the  porch  again. 

"  She'll  have  gone  for  a  stroll,  I  expect,"  he  mur 
mured,  and  hung  uncertain,  wondering  in  which  di- 

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rection  her  fancy  might  have  led  her.  He  went  out 
into  the  street  and  slowly  a  little  way  up  it.  But 
it  occurred  to  him  that  he  was  giving  himself  to  a 
foolish  quest.  There  was  small  chance  of  his  catch 
ing  Violet  up,  and  in  any  case  she  had  no  need  of 
him.  When  she  was  tired  of  her  stroll  she  would 
return  home.  The  place  was  too  small  and  too 
simple  to  lose  one's  way  in. 

So  David  halted  and  turned  to  go  back.  But 
his  eyes  took  sudden  note  of  where  he  stood — by 
a  certain  gate  of  memories,  before  a  certain  white, 
old  house,  half  hidden  among  its  trees.  He  took  a 
great  breath. 

"  It  cannot  be  put  off  forever,"  his  soul  said  with 
in  him.  But  he  had  put  off  the  thought  of  it, 
refused  to  face  it,  since  that  first  impulse  to  return 
to  Arcady.  He  put  out  his  hand  to  the  gate,  and 
the  gate  creaked  in  a  never-forgotten  way  of  its 
own. 

Within,  among  the  lilacs  and  syringas  of  the 
"front  yard,"  he  hesitated,  and  at  last  went  round 
by  the  little  flagged  path  to  the  side  of  the  house. 
At  the  inner  end  of  the  pleached  walk  there,  a  ser 
vant,  a  strong,  young  Irish  woman,  was  down  on  her 
sturdy  knees  scrubbing  the  doorstep.  He  asked 
for  Miss  Rosemary,  and  his  heart  stood  still  for  a 
space — was  there  a  Miss  Rosemary  ?  He  knew  that 
he  flushed  when  the  woman  said  she  thought  Miss 
Rosemary  was  in  the  garden.  David  thanked  her, 
and  said  that  he  would  go  there. 

He  went  as  one  walks  in  a  dream,  without  the 
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sense  of  motion  or  the  realization  of  what  lay  to 
right  and  left.  But  he  knew  that  she  would  be  on 
that  space  of  green  turf  under  the  apple-tree,  and 
his  feet  led  him  there.  He  stooped  under  the  rose- 
arch,  and  phlox  and  sweet-williams,  and  larkspurs 
and  love-in-a-mist  leaned  to  him  from  either 
side:  he  breathed  an  incense  of  heliotrope  and 
mignonette  and  thyme.  He  raised  his  eyes,  and 
something  white  stirred  beyond.  David  gave  a 
little  groan. 

She  had  seen  him  coming,  and  had  got,  somehow, 
to  her  feet,  so  that  she  stood  there,  sweet,  slim, 
virginal,  very  grave,  waiting  under  the  apple-tree. 
Her  two  hands  were  at  her  breast  as  he  had  remem 
bered  them. 

David  came  near  and  stood  before  her,  and  the 
girl  gave  a  low  cry.  The  marks  of  his  long  illness 
were  plain  upon  him,  and  the  marks  of  more  than 
that.  But  he  stood  quite  silent,  gazing — a  man 
stricken — so  that  presently  she  forgot  the  marks  of 
illness  and  despair,  remembering  only  that  he  was 
Davie,  and  that  at  last,  after  an  eternity  of  evil 
dreams,  he  had  come  home  to  her. 

Something  supernatural  smote  the  two  with  a 
very  potent  magic.  There  was  no  past  and  no 
future.  There  was  no  wrorld  save  a  vague  thing 
of  swirling  clouds,  immeasurable  distances  away, 
beneath  their  feet.  The  air  in  their  nostrils  turned 
suddenly  sharp  and  keen.  The  girl  spoke  in  a 
whisper. 

"Davie!  Davie!"  she  murmured,  and  her  arms 
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trembled  out  towards  him.  David  moved  a  step 
nearer,  and  he  began  to  shake.  Then  Rosemary's 
two  hands,  exquisitely  sweet  and  cool,  touched  his 
brow,  lay  upon  eyes  and  cheeks  and  lips,  went  to 
his  heart  and  rested  there.  Her  eyes,  as  very  long 
ago,  enveloped  him,  so  that  he  stood  bathed  in  a 
blue  light.  And  thus  they  remained  for  a  time, 
silent,  unmoving. 

It  was  David  who  broke  the  silence.  His  lips 
moved  once  or  twice,  but  no  sound  came.  At  last: 

"  I  have  starved — and  gone  thirsty — so  long!"  he 
whispered. 

"I  know!     I  know!"  she  answered. 

" I  have  gone  so  far!"  he  said.  "I'm  tired,  Rose- 
Marie!" 

"I  know,  Davie."  said  she.  "But  this  is  home, 
at  last.  Home  /" 

Abruptly  he  cried  out,  in  a  shaking  voice : 

"Oh,  who  are  you,  Rose-Marie?  What  are  you, 
that  no  other  woman  is  or  ever  was  ?"  He  dropped 
to  his  knees  before  her  like  a  worshipper  before  a 
shrine,  and  she  laid  her  cool  hands  over  his  face, 
looking  down  upon  him. 

"  I  am  Love,  Davie,"  she  said.  "  I  am  Rest  and 
Peace  and  Understanding.  I  am  the  Heights  and 
the  Depths.  I  am  the  Sweetness  that  makes  life 
sweet." 

No  other  woman  could  have  said  that.  Rose 
mary  could  not  have  said  it  at  another  time,  but 
the  something  supernatural  held  them  in  its  arms 
very  far  above  and  away  from  the  world.  They 

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stood  in  thin  air,  where  no  pretence  could  live,  their 
souls  stripped  of  all  but  naked  truth.  And  it  was 
naked  truth  that  the  girl  had  spoken,  or  that  some 
thing  had  spoken  through  her.  The  words  said 
themselves  very  slowly  over  and  over  again  in 
David's  mind,  like  the  slow  tolling  of  a  bell,  as  he 
knelt  on  the  turf  staring  upward.  "  Love — Rest — 
Peace ;  the  Heights  and  the  Depths ;  the  Sweetness 
that  makes  life  sweet."  She  was  just  that  to  him. 
Vaguely,  in  dim  visions,  he  had  known  it  before — 
when  she  had  saved  his  life,  when  she  had  after 
wards  come  to  him  in  that  dreadful  month  of  honey 
moon,  when  she  had  haunted  him  by  the  sea.  But 
now  he  knew  beyond  error  or  forgetting.  The  truth 
was  eternal,  as  eternal  as  she  herself. 

He  looked  up  to  her,  from  between  those  two  cool 
hands,  and  a  sort  of  still  wonder  swept  him.  As  in 
the  body  she  loomed  above  him  now,  so  always  in 
the  spirit  she  was  above  him — near,  as  close  as  his 
own  blood  to  his  flesh,  but  above.  She  was  the 
eternal  woman,  the  "Sweetness  that  makes  life 
sweet,"  as  she  had  said.  She  was  beauty,  death 
less  and  everlasting — the  world's  desire  since  life 
was  first  born  into  the  world ;  the  star  to  the  sailor ; 
the  moon  to  the  straining  tides;  the  spring  to  the 
flowers ;  the  something  longed-for  by  land  and  sea ; 
the  sweet,  full  answer  to  the  soul's  yearning. 

"This  is  home,  Davie,"  she  said  again,  divinely 
smiling  down  to  him.  "  Home,  at  last !"  But  quite 
suddenly  the  smile  paled  away  from  her  lips  and  a 
sort  of  dark  horror  came  into  her  great  eyes.  She 

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put  her  hands  up  to  her  cheeks  and  moved  back 
ward  a  step,  stumbling  as  she  went — and  another 
step.  David,  kneeling  on  the  turf,  watched  her, 
and  after  a  moment  he  understood.  From  him,  as 
from  the  girl,  that  magic  veil  of  oblivion  was  rent 
away,  so  that  the  world  about  him  came  once  more 
into  his  ken,  and  he  remembered. 

"Home!"  he  repeated,  with  a  slow  bitterness. 
"  Home  !  But  I  have  no  longer  a  right  here.  I've 
no  right."  He  got  to  his  feet  as  if  the  effort  were 
a  painful  one,  and  for  a  little  time  he  stood  bent, 
staring  under  his  brows  at  the  girl  before  him,  and 
it  seemed  to  her  that  in  those  few  seconds  he  grew 
many  years  older  and  very  weary  and  haggard,  like 
a  man  who  has  no  hope.  So  that  presently  she 
could  not  bear  it  any  longer  and  put  out  her  hands 
to  him  with  a  little  cry  of  protest. 

"  Ah  yes,  yes,  Davie!"  she  exclaimed.  "  Yes,  you 
have  a  place  here  always — always!  I  didn't  mean 
that.  I  won't  let  you  say  that!  Only  —  at  first, 
for  a  little  while,  we  both — forgot — things.  It  had 
been  so  long,  so  long!  We  forgot  what — mustn't 
be  forgotten.  We  won't  do  that — any  more.  Oh 
yes,  Davie,  there's  always  a  place  for  you  here — at 
home  /" 

She  tried  to  make  him  sit  down  in  one  of  the 
ancient  cane  chairs  that  were  there,  complaining 
that  he  looked  tired  and  ill,  but  David  would  not 
be  coddled.  He  insisted  upon  her  making  herself 
comfortable  first,  and  then  upon  settling  himself  on 
the  turf  at  her  feet.  It  was  as  they  had  sat  on  that 

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far  day  of  the  very  beginning  of  things,  seven  years 
before. 

Rosemary  grieved  over  his  thin  cheeks  and  his 
pallor.  She  had  read  in  a  paper  of  his  illness  nearly 
a  year  ago,  but,  having  heard  no  more  about  it,  had 
supposed  him  recovered  long  since.  She  asked 
questions,  and  David  told  her  briefly  of  his  wander 
ings  and  of  how  he  could  not  work.  He  told  her 
about  the  burned  novel — sweet  tears  came  to  her 
eyes  over  that,  and  she  put  down  a  hand  to  touch 
his  cheek,  but  withdrew  it,  flushing — and  about  the 
long,  dull  lethargy  which  had  cloaked  him.  He  did 
not  bring  Violet  into  the  matter  either  by  name  or 
implication,  but  the  girl  watched  his  worn  face,  and 
because  she  loved  him  knew  all  or  much  that  he 
would  not  say  —  knew  what  had  checked  and 
wrecked  him  and  had  been  a  stumbling-block  to 
his  hurrying  feet. 

She  covered  her  face  with  her  hands  and  sat  a 
little  while  silent. 

"Oh,  Davie,"  she  said,  at  last,  "what  strange, 
grim  games  fate  plays  with  us  all  in  this  strange 
world!"  But  David  shook  his  head. 

"No,  Rose-Marie!"  She  caught  a  quick  breath 
over  the  old,  sweet  name.  "No.  I've  tried  to 
lay  it  to  fate,  to  chance,  to  a  score  of  things,  but 
I've  come  to  see  it  more  clearly  than  that.  There 
has  been  no  fate  in  it.  It  has  come  from  within 
ourselves,  as  do  all  things,  I  expect.  In  the  begin 
ning  I  might  have  entered  Paradise ;  the  gates  were 
open  to  me  once.  Then  Robert  Henley,  who  was 

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ambitious  for  me,  sent  me  away.  And  I  let  him 
do  it.  Neither  he  nor  I  would  allow  ourselves  to 
realize  what  I  was  losing.  He  wanted  me  to  get 
on.  Then  there  was  some  little  wretched  misunder 
standing  about  letters,  and,  instead  of  sweeping 
it  aside,  I  let  it  break  off  our  correspondence.  I 
was  ambitious.  I  wouldn't  be  bound.  Sometimes  I 
thought  of  you.  You  came  to  me,  sweeter  and 
more  exquisite  than  anything  in  dreams  or  imagin 
ings,  but  I  drove  you  away.  With  all  my  strength 
I  drove  you  away,  because  I  wouldn't  be  bound. 
Once  you  wrote  me  a  letter  saying  something  about 
all  my  friends  here  being  married  and  settled  down 
by  the  time  I  should  visit  Croydon  again."  He 
looked  up  to  her  suddenly.  "  Have  you  been  en 
gaged,  Rose-Marie?"  he  said. 

She  gave  a  little  sob  of  anguish. 

"Oh,  Davie!  Davie!"  she  cried,  with  tears. 
"  Did  I  make  you  think  that?  Seriously?  It  was 
a  wretched,  wretched  little  bit  of  bravado.  I  said, 
'  If  he  cares  anything  at  all,  if  he  hasn't  quite  for 
gotten,  that  will  make  him  come  or  write.'  Oh, 
Davie!" 

"I  let  myself  believe  it  was  true,"  he  answered. 
"  It  was  easier  so  —  to  put  the  responsibility  upon 
you.  It  saved  my  self-esteem  a  very  little,  perhaps. 
And  old  Uncle  Robert  helped  it  on.  He  let  us  be 
lieve  that  he  thought  you  were  engaged.  I  think  I 
know  why.  Then — I  married."  He  halted  there 
for  a  little,  looking  down  at  the  turf  below  him, 
but  the  girl  who  sat  above  saw  his  averted  face, 

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and  those  tell-tale  hands  of  hers  went  out  to  him — 
yearned  over  him,  mother-wise,  and  were  drawn 
back  trembling.  "  So  there  has  been  no  fate  in  it," 
he  went  on.  "  I  have  done  it  all  myself,  with  one 
or  two  to  help.  Everything  that  has  come  to  me — 
everything  —  I  can  trace  back  to  the  one  starting- 
point.  I  was  ambitious,  and  I  set  ambition  before 
love.  There  is  no  excuse  to  take  comfort  in,  save 
one  little  excuse.  I  was  a  boy — a  child ;  I  could  not 
know  the  greatness  and  the  glory  of  what  I  was 
giving  up."  All  at  once  he  raised  his  eyes  to  her. 
"Yet  you  knew!"  he  said,  with  a  sort  of  wonder. 
"  I  think  you  knew!" 

"I  was  a  woman,  Davie,"  said  she,  "even  though 
I  was  a  child.  We  women  are  born  knowing  some 
things.  We  do  not  learn — we  know,  in  some  strange 
way,  from  antiquity." 

A  sudden  thought  came  to  him. 

"Where  were  you,  Rose-Marie,"  he  asked,  "on 
the  night  of  the  twentieth  of  September — not  last 
autumn,  but  the  autumn  before — the  autumn  I 
was  married  ?  Do  you  remember  anything  of  that 
night?  Was  it  in  any  way  unusual  to  you?" 

Rosemary's  face  had  gone  perfectly  white.  Her 
hands  began  to  tremble. 

"Davie!  Davie!  Davie!"  she  said,  in  slow,  whis 
pering  gasps.  "  Did  I — truly  come  to  you  on  that 
night?"  she  said,  after  a  time.  "Did  I  come  to 
you  ?  Were  you  in  danger,  as  I  thought  you  were  ?" 

"You  came  to  me  and  saved  my  life,"  he  an 
swered. 

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Rosemary  covered  her  face  with  her  hands. 

"I  used  to  pray  to  God  very,  very  earnestly, 
Davie,"  she  said,  after  another  little  interval, 
"begging  that  if  ever  you  needed  me,  if  ever  I 
could  help  you,  if  ever  you  were  in  any  danger, 
I  might  know  and  might  be  allowed  to  come  to 
you.  I  prayed  that  so  hard  that  I  think  God 
heard  and  let  me  come.  Oh,  I  am  so  beautifully 
glad!  So  glad!"  Presently  she  took  her  hands  from 
before  her  face  and  looked  down  at  him.  "There 
is  another  strange  thing,"  she  continued.  "My 
dear  father,  Davie,  died  on  your  wedding-night. 
Was  not  that  strange?  I  didn't  know  it  was  your 
wedding-night  until  two  or  three  days  later,  when 
I  saw  a  notice  in  a  paper — but  when  father  died  he 
— went  unwillingly,  though  he  had  been  peaceful  up 
to  the  last  hour.  He — clung  to  me,  saying  that  he 
was  going  just  when  I  needed  him  most.  He  said 
it  again  and  again,  and  I  wondered  what  he  meant. 
Later  I — thought  I  knew.  Oh,  there  are  so  many 
strange  things  between  you  and  me!" 

And  after  a  time  she  began  to  tell  him  of  what 
she  had  done  after  her  father's  death ;  how  she  had 
taken  her  mother  abroad  in  search  of  change  and 
rest,  and  how  they  had  remained  there  for  more 
than  a  year,  in  Paris  and  in  the  south  of  France  and 
at  Carlsbad. 

David  gave  a  sudden  little  laugh. 

"That  explains  something,  then!"  he  said. 
"That  explains  the  'simple  and  inexpensive  mus 
lin  '  thing  you're  wearing  to-day.  I'm  a  mere  man, 

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and  men  are  supposed  not  to  notice  such  things  or 
to  know  about  them,  but  that  frock  was  made  by 
Paquin  or  by  Doucet  or  somebody  good.  That 
never  grew  in  Croydon." 

"  Well,  you're  quite  wrong,"  she  answered,  patting 
his  shoulder  with  a  patronizing  hand.  "After  all, 
you  are  a  mere  man,  Davie.  This  was  made  by  a 
very  humble  person  in  the  Boulevard  Haussmann, 
though  I'm  not  saying  that  the  humble  person 
hadn't  a  sense  of  line.  Fancy  Paquin  or  Doucet 
making  the  kind  of  thing  that  one  could  wear  about 
Croydon  in  the  morning!  I  have  some  Doucet 
things,  though,  Davie.  Oh,  ducks  of  dresses!  You 
shall  see  them.  I  look  almost  pretty  in  my  Doucet 
frocks." 

David  laughed  in  her  face,  and  she  laughed  back 
at  him — her  old  laugh  of  the  other  days,  a  sort  of 
delicious  gurgle.  But  all  at  once  the  man's  face 
turned  serious,  and  a  little  flush  came  to  it. 

"Then  I  did  see  you  in  Paris!"  he  cried  out. 
"By  Jove,  I  did  see  you  in  Paris,  after  all — last 
November,  driving  in  the  Champs  Elyse"es  one 
afternoon!  I  thought  that  I — that  it  was  only  a 
— truer  vision  than  before.  I'd  been  used  to  seeing 
you  so  often!  But  this  time  I  would  have  sworn 
it  was  you  in  the  flesh,  only  some  one  who  was  with 
me — only  Violet  said  that  I  was  mistaken.  And  it 
was  you,  after  all.  I  was  frightened  a  little.  I 
thought  I  might  be  going  mad." 

"Oh,  Davie,  Davie!"  she  exclaimed,  pleading. 
She  drew  him  away  from  the  subject,  for  she  saw 

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that  it  saddened  him,  carried  him  back  into  a  sort 
of  gloom  and  bitterness.  She  made  him  talk  of  oth 
er  things.  Once  or  twice  she  smoothed  down  the 
long,  clinging  lines  of  the  "simple  and  inexpensive 
muslin"  with  the  naive  gesture  of  a  child  caressing 
a  new  toy,  and  David  laughed  at  her  delightedly. 
She  thought  that  each  time  he  laughed  a  little  more 
of  the  weariness  and  languor  lifted  from  his  tired 
face,  and  more  of  the  old  Davie  returned — the  boy- 
Davie  of  the  beginning  of  things. 

He  stayed  a  long  while,  until  at  last  the  little 
silvery  bell  rang  at  the  top  of  the  garden  for  lunch, 
and  then  he  sprang  up  with  an  exclamation  of 
astonishment. 

"Good  Lord!  Have  I  spent  the  entire  morning 
here?"  he  cried.  "It  seemed  to  me — I  thought  I 
had  been  here  no  more  than  an  hour." 

Rosemary  smiled  into  his  eyes. 

"It  has  seemed  very  short  to  me  also,  Davie," 
said  she.  "Oh,  come  often.  Spend  many  morn 
ings  here.  I  think  it's  good  for  you.  You  look  bet 
ter,  stronger,  cheerfuller  already.  Croydon's  going 
to  be  good  for  you.  I'm  sure  of  that." 

David  gave  a  little,  shaking  laugh,  and  his  eyes 
were  bright. 

"I  feel  like — a  boy  again!"  he  said.  "Like  a 
boy !  I — think  it  was  only  yesterday  I  went  away. ' ' 


CHAPTER   XXV 

SO,  after  long  travail  and  anguish,  David  came 
home  from  the  wars,  and  Rosemary,  in  her 
magic  garden,  soothed  him  and  healed  his  wounds. 
He  dwelt,  during  these  Croydon  days,  in  a  sort  of 
haze  of  enchantment.  Boyhood  and  the  golden 
age  were  returned  upon  him,  bitterness  and  soul- 
struggle,  the  hopeless,  entangled  coil  into  which  his 
thread  of  destiny  was  snarled,  stood  apart,  act 
ual  enough,  but  faint  and  far,  like  wrangling  cries 
heard  through  sweet,  summer  air  from  a  great  dis 
tance,  something  very  remote  and  undisturbing. 
It  is  to  be  presumed  that  he  did  not,  as  in  those 
first  few  poignant  moments,  forget  the  world  where 
in  he  dwelt.  He  remembered,  but  the  facts  had 
no  power  to  torture  him.  His  soul  was  bathed  in 
some  strange  sweetness  which  made  it  invulnerable 
to  all  assault. 

He  drifted,  his  eyes  upon  Rosemary's  eyes,  his 
hand — to  speak  figuratively — in  Rosemary's  hand, 
his  mind  emptied  of  volition,  almost  of  thought 
itself,  following  where  Rosemary  led,  trustingly,  like 
a  little  child,  for,  body  and  soul,  he  was  spent  with 
anguish,  and  he  gave  himself  to  this  delicious  spell 
as  a  weary  man  to  sleep. 

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But  there  were  two  who  looked  on  and  rejoiced 
or  bled,  wept  or  exulted,  in  accordance  with  the 
very  different  minds  and  natures  they  brought  to 
the  matter.  Robert  Henley,  hawklike,  fiercely  ten 
der  as  of  old,  watched  with  anxious  eyes,  pres 
ently  saw  that  the  thing  was  good,  and  so  contented 
himself.  David's  worn  face  and  bitter,  dulled  eyes 
had  been  a  terrible  shock  to  the  old  man,  had  roused 
him  to  a  very  fury  of  grief  and  remorse  and  alarm. 
A-tremble  with  frightened  anxiety,  he  cried  out  for 
any  means  which  might  work  a  cure — any  way, 
however  desperate.  It  must  have  seemed  to  him 
a  very  grim  buffet  from  the  hand  of  God  that  Rose 
mary,  against  whom  he  had  fought  so  bitterly  and 
so  long,  should  prove  to  be  the  only  way,  the  sweet 
salvation  for  David's  outwearied  soul. 

Meanwhile  the  woman,  the  stumbling-block, 
stood  beside  and  watched  and  held  her  peace,  and 
fought  with  various  devils  for  David's  sake  or  for 
her  own.  In  the  beginning  jealousy  racked  her, 
the  raw,  unleavened  jealousy  of  woman  against 
woman,  with  a  passionate  fierceness  that  left  her 
amazed.  Followed,  with  recurrent  paroxysms  of 
the  more  primal  emotion,  alarm  for  David,  fear  of 
the  lengths  this  blind  drifting  might  lead  him  to. 

She  expressed  her  fears  to  Robert  Henley,  for 
between  the  two  had  sprung  up  an  odd  friendship, 
almost  an  intimacy,  which  was  the  result  of  tem 
peramental  attraction,  certain  sympathies  of  mind 
and  taste.  Both  were  melancholic  by  nature,  both 
profoundly  cynical  over  this  mismanaged  world  and 

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all  its  works,  both  introspective  and  analytical. 
Further,  they  had  a  common  cause  to  be  pursued 
after  their  widely  differing  fashions — the  welfare  of 
David  Rivers.  Withal  the  two  were  eternally  at 
quarrel,  for  old  Robert  made  no  secret  at  all  of  his 
bitter  resentment  against  the  woman,  of  his  dislike 
for  her  as  a  human  being  (aside  from  her  mental 
qualities),  and  of  his  conviction  that  the  world  in 
general  and  David  Rivers  in  particular  would  have 
been  infinitely  the  better  had  she  never  lived.  He 
was  a  terribly  frank  old  man,  and  was  often  brutal 
beyond  pardon,  but  Violet  bore  with  him,  even 
taking  a  sort  of  mediaeval  satisfaction  in  the  hurts 
he  inflicted  upon  her — a  flagellation,  it  might  be, 
leading  to  grace. 

In  the  matter  of  her  alarm  over  David  exposed 
to  the  wiles  of  the  enchantress  he  fell  into  a  tower 
ing  rage. 

"  My  God,  ma'am!"  he  cried,  "  have  you  not  done 
harm  enough  to  the  lad?  Would  you  take  away 
from  him  the  only  thing  in  the  world  that  can  save 
him  now,  after  your  bungling  and  mine  ?"  His  face 
gave  that  sudden,  bitter  twist  awry  which  was 
habitual  to  it.  "God  made  them  for  each  other," 
said  he.  "  I  know  that,  now.  I  have  been  afraid 
of  it  for  a  long  time.  You,  ma'am,  have  seen  them 
together.  Have  you  eyes  ?  I  thought  I  was  wiser 
than  God  and  so  I  rent  them  apart  long  ago,  and 
sent  David  away.  Even  then  I  might  have  known, 
the  thing  was  plain ;  but  I  would  not  have  the  boy 
hampered.  Then  came  you  and  took  him  when  he 

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was  climbing  fast  and  high — took  him  and  wrecked 
him.  It  may  be  that  the  same  God  will  forgive 
you  for  that.  I  cannot.  But  if  there  is  any  love 
for  David  in  you,  any  sorrow  for  what  you  have 
done  to  him,  any  thought  or  feeling  that  mounts 
above  your  own  hurts  and  disappointments,  let 
him  be;  let  this  girl  who  loves  him  comfort  him 
and  win  him  back  to  life.  Say  no  word  to  him! 
Let  him  be!" 

The  woman  gave  him  a  white  smile.  His  sav 
agery  met  no  resentment  in  her.  She  had  become 
accustomed  to  it. 

"  I  cannot  believe  that  good  will  come  of  it,"  she 
urged.  "What  but  harm  can  come  of  it?  This 
wonderful  girl  loves  him,  as  you  have  said.  What 
does  that  mean,  then,  but  ultimate  misery  for  every 
one  concerned — for  both  of  them  ?"  Old  Robert  did 
not  answer  at  once,  and  she  went  on.  "  David  is, 
after  all,  human,  Mr.  Henley.  He  cannot  be  long 
with  that  girl  without  loving  her.  It  would  be 
impossible.  She  is  by  far  the  most  beautiful 
woman  I  ever  saw,  and  she  is — she  is  very  at 
tractive.  She's  not  a  pretty  fool.  She  reads  and 
thinks.  There's  more  to  her  than  beauty — much 
more.  Is  it  helping  David  to  leave  him  with  her 
day  after  day  ?  He — doesn't  know.  David  doesn't 
know.  He  doesn't  realize  where  he  is  drifting.  I 
am  sure  of  that.  He  lives  in  a  sort  of  dream. 
Ought  we  not  to  waken  him?  Oh,  I  am  afraid!" 

" Madam,"  said  Robert  Henley,  "you  and  I  have 
already  tried  usurping  God's  office  towards  David 

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Rivers — with  ill  success.  In  this  present  instance  I 
beg  you  to  leave  God  to  His  own  devices.  It  may 
be  that  He  is  wiser  than  we  are.  Assuredly  it  is 
God,  Fate,  Omnipotence — what  you  will— that  has 
at  last  brought  these  two  together.  Let  us  not 
interfere!  There  may  be  ways  beyond  our  ken." 

'"Ways  beyond  our  ken'  ?"  she  repeated,  slowly, 
staring  across  at  him.  "  What  ways,  I  wonder?" 

"  Bide  and  see,  ma'am!"  said  old  Robert  Henley, 
very  earnestly.  "  Bide  awhile  and  see!" 

"Is  it  God?"  she  asked. 

"  It  is  something,  ma'am,"  said  he.  "  It  was  not 
chance  that  brought  David  back  to  Croydon.  That 
much  is  sure.  Shall  we  not,  then,  go  one  step  for 
ward  and  call  it  God — to  give  it  a  name  ?  Some 
thing  it  was,  wiser  than  we,  as  witnesses  the  change 
in  David  during  this  past  week.  Has  he  not  grown 
young  again  ?  Has  not  color  come  to  his  face,  light 
to  his  eyes?  Let  us  call  it  God  at  work  repairing 
wrong  love,  fashioning  out  His  ancient  plans!  God 
is  inscrutable,  Mrs.  Rivers.  We  cannot  say  what 
He  has  in  store  for  David." 

The  woman  gave  a  sudden  violent  shiver. 

"  I  am  afraid,"  she  said,  still  again.  "  I  wonder," 
she  said,  oddly,  "if  God  will  crush  me  out  to  save 
David." 

"His  ways,  ma'am,"  said  Robert  Henley,  "are 
held  to  be  beyond  our  ken." 

He  fell  into  a  glooming,  staring  fit  of  abstraction. 
His  lips  mumbled  from  time  to  time,  but  it  was 
difficult  to  hear  the  words  he  spoke.  Once  he  said: 

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' '  Brave  eyes !  Sweet  eyes ! ' '  And ,  another  time : 
"  Ay,  she  loved  him !  She  loved  him !"  And,  again: 
"Who  was  I  to  meddle  with  God's  work?  Who 
was  I  ?"  And  once  he  spoke  a  woman's  name,  but 
it  was  not  Rosemary's. 

At  last  he  raised  his  sombre  eyes  and  met  the  eyes 
of  the  woman  who  stared  at  him  across  the  shadowy 
room  where  the  dusk  was  gathering. 

"For  love's  sake,"  he  muttered,  "I  did  a  great 
sin  against  David,  whom  above  all  things  earthly 
or  divine — save  one  memory — I  loved,  and  against 
God." 

"What  sin?"  said  the  woman. 

"I  set  ambition  above  love,"  he  answered.  "I 
said  that  love  might  come  after.  I  said  that  his 
success  was  the  greater  thing  to  strive  for,  and  to  it 
I  sacrificed  his  clean  young  love  and — her.  Fool! 
Fool!  Fool!" 

The  woman  leaned  towards  him  with  a  sudden 
eagerness. 

"You  have  lived  a  long  time,  sir,"  said  she. 
"You  are — an  old  man,  and  you  should  be  wise. 
Tell  me!  Is  love  the  greatest  thing?" 

"As  God  lives,"  affirmed  old  Robert  Henley, 
"  there  is  in  this  world  nothing  so  great  or  so  worthy 
as  love.  Whoever  sacrifices  love  to  any  other  thing 
save  honor  is  a  fool.  Ay,  ma'am,  I  am  an  old  man, 
and  old  men  are  commonly  believed  to  have  done 
with  love  and  such — to  have  forgotten.  I — cannot 
forget.  When  I  come  to  die  I  shall  die  with  one 
woman's  face  before  my  eyes  upon  the  dark,  with 

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one  woman's  name  upon  my  stilling  lips.  And  yet — 
for  love's  sake  I  robbed  David  of  his  love  and  sent 
him  away.  /  who  knew!  It  is  a  bitter,  bitter  thing 
to  look  back  upon."  His  keen  eyes  brightened 
suddenly  into  their  wonted  fire,  and  flashed  upon 
David's  wife.  "But,"  said  he,  "all  would  have 
come  right  in  its  good  time  but  for  you!  The  lad 
would  have  come  to  her  like  a  homing  bird  but 
that  you  snared  him  and  kept  him  away." 

The  woman  stirred  resentfully  in  her  chair  and 
she  gave  a  little,  bitter  laugh. 

"  Oh  yes,  I  am  all  that  is  reprehensible  and  vile," 
she  said.  "I  grant  you  that.  I  shall  not  try  to 
contend  with  you  over  my  iniquity.  But  do  we 
gain  anything  by  recrimination  ?  It  is  agreed  that 
I  have  wrecked  poor  David — have  stolen  him  from 
you.  Can  I  give  him  back?  That  is  beyond  my 
power,  I  should  think." 

"There  remains  God,  ma'am,"  said  Robert  Hen 
ley.  "  His  power  is  somewhat  greater." 

But  Violet  shook  her  head. 

"  I  have  an  odd  feeling,"  said  she,  "  that  God  will 
not  interfere.  The  matter  has  been  in  our  hands 
— in  yours  and  David's  and  mine  and  Rosemary 
Crewe's  from  the  beginning.  I  have  a  feeling  that 
somehow  we  must  work  it  out  ourselves.  I  wonder 
how?" 

"  I  wonder,  ma'am,"  said  the  old  man,  thought 
fully. 

19 


CHAPTER  XXVI 

A  WEEK  after  this  Violet  went  to  Rochester 
for  the  day,  starting  at  early  morning.  She 
said  that  she  had  shopping  to  do  and  refused  to 
allow  David  to  go  with  her,  protesting  that  the 
journey  would  bore  him  and  that  he  would  only 
be  in  her  way.  She  took  her  maid  for  company. 

David,  left  behind,  spent  the  morning  over  a 
short  story  which  he  had  sketched  out,  and  worked 
readily  and  well,  almost  with  his  old  freedom  and 
quick  fertility  of  invention.  The  afternoon  he 
passed  in  Rosemary's  garden,  but  towards  six 
o'clock  drove  to  the  station  to  meet  his  wife. 

It  seemed  to  him  that  she  looked  white  and  tired 
when  she  came  out  of  the  train  to  join  him,  and  he 
said  so,  but  Violet  answered  rather  absently  that 
she  was  quite  all  right,  and  that  it  was  only  the  heat 
which  had  made  her  pale.  She  had  two  or  three 
small  parcels,  which  the  maid  carried.  She  had 
been  unable  to  find  most  of  the  things  she  wanted, 
she  explained,  and  she  spoke  a  bit  uncharitably  of 
Rochester's  shopping  facilities. 

Further,  she  seemed  distrait  beyond  her  habit, 
silent  and  preoccupied,  and  when  they  had  reached 
home  shut  herself  up  in  her  own  room  and  had  her 

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dinner  there  alone,  sending  out  word  to  David  that 
she  found  herself,  after  all,  with  a  headache,  and 
wished  not  to  be  disturbed.  So  David,  after  his 
dinner,  went  off  to  spend  the  evening  with  old 
Robert  Henley,  but  the  woman  sat  alone  in  her 
room  while  the  light  dimmed  to  dusk  and  the  night 
came.  She  made  no  lights,  but  when  it  became 
dark  went  to  an  open  window  and  crouched  there 
beside  it,  staring  out  into  the  cool,  sweet  gloom, 
where,  under  a  sky  of  stars,  the  leaves  stirred  and 
whispered  in  the  breeze.  Delectable  odors  rose  to 
her  and  breathed  upon  her  face;  the  gentle  night 
sounds — crickets,  birds  cheeping  sleepily,  the  sound 
of  feet  upon  the  flagstones  below,  the  barking  of  a 
dog  far  away,  the  distant  whistle  of  a  train — came 
to  her  ears  and  should  have  soothed  them,  but  the 
woman  made  no  sign  of  being  at  peace.  Indeed, 
she  made  no  sign  of  anything  at  all.  If  she  felt 
any  emotion  she  did  not  show  it.  She  crouched, 
half -kneeling,  beside  her  window,  and  the  sweet 
night  breeze  bathed  her,  and,  after  a  long  time,  the 
moonlight  came  down  through  a  space  in  the  leaves, 
and  her  face  was  white  and  still  in  it — a  marble 
face  with  neither  grief  nor  joy. 

Towards  midnight  David  knocked  at  the  door, 
and  she  rose  and  crossed  the  room.  But  when  she 
had  reached  the  door  she  did  not  draw  the  bolt; 
she  leaned  against  the  panels  and  said : 

"I'm  all  right,  David.  Don't  bother,  please! 
I've  a  wretched  headache,  that's  all.  I'm  too  cross 
to  talk  to-night." 

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David  said  how  sorry  he  was,  and  asked  if  there 
was  anything  he  could  do  for  her. 

She  answered:  "  No!  I  shall  get  on  well  enough. 
Good-night!" 

He  said:  "Good-night,"  and  she  heard  him  move 
away  from  the  door.  At  that  she  called  out: 
"David!"  and  heard  him  halt  and  return. 

"  I — think  I  shall  want  to  talk  to  you  to-morrow 
morning ;"  she  added :  " — about  something.  I  can't 
talk  it  over  to-night.  I'm  too  tired.  You'll  be 
here  in  the  morning,  I  suppose?" 

"Oh,  I'm  sorry,"  said  David.  "I  was  going  to 
motor  to  Caledonia.  Of  course,  I'll  stop  at  home 
if  it's  important  or  pressing." 

She  did  not  answer  at  once,  and  after  a  moment 
he  asked: 

"Would  you  like  me  to  stop?  If  it's  important 
I  will,  of  course." 

"  No,"  she  replied,  rather  slowly.  "  Never  mind. 
It  can  wait  until  afternoon  or  evening.  It  doesn't 
matter."  And  after  another  moment  she  said: 
"Good-night!  I  shall  go  to  bed  now,  I  think," 
and  turned  away  from  the  door.  But  instead  of 
going  to  bed  she  crossed  again  to  her  place  beside 
the  window  where  the  moonlight  lay  white  and 
still,  and  she  crouched  down  in  the  pallid  glow  as 
if  the  glow  were  grateful  to  her. 

"When  he — knows,"  she  said,  after  a  time — and 
it  was  as  if  after  a  long  time  of  thought  she  began 
to  think  aloud — "when  he  knows  he  won't  let  me 
go  alone.  He'll  go  too.  And  so  once  more  I  shall 

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have  been  a  stumbling-block  to  him — a  stumbling- 
block."  She  said  the  word  over  and  over  again  to 
herself  with  a  sort  of  dull  bitterness.  "The  mill 
stone  round  his  neck,"  she  said;  "the  ball-and- 
chain  to  his  ankle.  Why  does  nobody  ever  pity 
the  millstones  and  the  balls-and-chains  ?  They 
suffer  too.  I  ought  to  know,  for  I'm  one  my 
self." 

She  thrust  her  two  arms  out  across  the  window- 
ledge  towards  the  soft  breeze  which  stirred,  and 
the  loose  sleeves  of  her  house-gown  fell  away,  leav 
ing  them  straight  and  white  and  slender  in  the 
moonlight.  She  looked  down  at  them  with  a  quick 
little  intake  of  the  breath,  as  if  the  sudden  sight  of 
them  so  surprised  her. 

"Oh,  not  a  very  heavy  millstone,  David!"  said 
she.  "There's  little  left  of  me.  Such  pinched 
shreds  of  arms!"  She  gave  an  exclamation  of 
disgust  and  pulled  the  lace  down  to  her  hands. 

Indeed,  she  was  at  this  time  much  thinner  than 
ever  before,  though  she  had  always  been  too  thin ; 
but  there  was  no  one  to  note  the  change  in  her,  for 
the  people  of  Croydon  were  strangers  and  David's 
eyes  were  turned  away. 

"There's  little  left  of  me,"  she  went  on.  "I 
dare  say  it  would  be  better  for  every  one  if  there 
were  nothing  left  at  all."  But  at  that  a  sudden 
great  shiver  swept  her.  "Ah  no!  no!"  she  cried 
out,  breathless,  as  though  in  terror.  "  I  don't  want 
to  die!  I  won't  die.  I  want  to  live.  I  want  to 
live!" 

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Robert  Henley  came  upon  her  next  morning  in 
Main  Street,  where  she  walked  listlessly,  her  eyes 
on  the  ground.  He  had  to  speak  to  her  twice  before 
she  heard  him.  Old  Robert  was  on  his  way  home 
wards,  and  since  they  were  near  his  gate  asked 
Mrs.  Rivers  to  come  in ;  she  had  been  used  to  make 
her  calls  upon  him  at  all  unconventional  hours  of 
the  day.  She  followed  him,  listlessly  still,  rather 
in  the  fashion  of  one  who  lacks  the  spirit  to  decline. 
But  Robert  was  accustomed  to  varying  and  whim 
sical  moods  in  her  and  paid  small  attention. 

He  was  himself  wellnigh  chuckling  with  good 
spirits,  at  peace  with  all  the  world;  and  he  made 
laborious  little  jokes  and  laughed  at  them  consum- 
edly  as  he  led  the  way  into  his  grim  and  darkened 
fortress  and  on  into  the  study,  where  was  that 
strange,  faint  odor  compounded  of  leathern  books 
and  of  sandal-wood.  He  had  seen  David  an  hour 
before  as  David  was  starting  out  upon  his  motor 
ing-trip  to  Caledonia,  and  the  younger  man's  cheer 
ful  bearing  seemed  to  have  put  into  him  a  glow  of 
delight  which  beamed  from  his  gray  old  face  like  a 
winter's  afternoon. 

"Eh,  David's  a  changed  lad!"  he  repeated  again 
and  again.  "We've  made  a  boy  of  him  again — 
thanks  be  to  God — and  one  other!  It  was  the  old 
gay  David  I  saw  this  morning  —  the  lad  I  knew 
years  ago.  A  month  more  and  we  shall  have  cured 
him — a  little  month  more!" 

Violet  looked  up  at  him  soberly.  "  Yes,"  she  as 
sented  .  ' '  Yes — no  doubt. ' ' 

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"  He  is  getting  to  work  again,"  swept  on  old 
Robert.  "He  told  me  so.  He's  shaping  out  a 
short  story,  and  he  has  been  talking  to  Rosemary 
Crewe  about  a  new  book  that's  begun  to  simmer  in 
him.  How's  that  for  good  hearing,  ma'am?  He's 
actually  at  work  again,  and  it  goes  as  it  used  to  go — 
fast  and  ready  and  free.  He  told  me  so  himself." 

"  Yesl"  answered  the  woman  again,  dully.   "  Yes." 

"Oh  yes  I"  she  said,  after  a  pause.  "  David  must 
be  happy  to  do  good  work ;  that's  plain.  He  must 
be  free  of — worries.  It's  rather  odd,  isn't  it?  So 
many  writers  and  painters  and  such  have  done 
their  best  work  when  they  were  suffering  the  most 
deeply — when  they  were  starving  and  miserable 
and  in  debt.  David  seems  to  be  different.  Un- 
happiness  seems  to — paralyze  him." 

"Well,  he's  happy  now,"  said  old  Robert,  nod 
ding  cheerily.  "  We've  only  to  let  him  alone,  now. 
We've  only  to  avoid  disturbing  him.  David's  him 
self  again,  thank  Heaven!" 

"  It  would  be  a  great  pity,  wouldn't  it,  to  disturb 
him,"  asked  the  woman,  looking  down. 

Old  Robert  gave  a  short,  fierce  laugh. 

"  I  should  like  to  see  any  one  try!"  he  exclaimed. 
"  My  God,  ma'am,  we  have  called  the  lad  back  from 
the  very  brink  of  ruin,  the  very  brink  of  it!"  He 
bristled  at  her  in  his  old  formidable  fashion,  and 
the  woman,  watching  him,  gave  a  little  laugh  that 
had  no  mirth  in  it. 

"  You'd  boil  us  all  in  oil  for  David's  sake,  wouldn't 
you?"  she  said. 

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"  He's  all  I  have  left,"  answered  old  Robert  Hen 
ley.  "And  he  has  suffered  enough." 

The  woman  looked  at  him  thoughtfully,  with  a 
sort  of  grave  curiosity. 

"Do  you  know,  it's  most  unusual,"  said  she, 
"this  positively  savage  fondness  of  yours  for 
David.  There  is  no  relationship  between  you.  I 
wonder  about  it  sometimes.  I  wonder  why  you 
love  him  so?" 

Old  Robert's  eyes  met  hers,  and  it  seemed  to  her 
that  there  was  in  them  something  odd  and  un 
familiar,  so  that  she  wondered  the  more.  He  sat 
silent  for  a  long  time,  then,  at  last,  got  to  his  feet, 
moving  stiffly. 

"  I  think  I  should  like  to  show  you,"  he  replied. 
"  You  are  David's  wife.  I  think  I  should  like  you 
to  know.  Will  you  come  with  me?" 

He  led  the  way  out  of  the  room,  and  along  the 
darkened  hallway  to  another  room,  the  door  of 
which  had  to  be  unlocked — a  dim  place,  where  the 
chairs  and  tables  stood  about  sheeted,  like  tomb 
stones  in  a  graveyard.  Old  Robert  opened  a  blind, 
and  a  shaft  of  living  sunlight  slanted  in.  He  went 
to  the  wall  where  the  shaft  of  sunlight  pointed,  and 
pulled  open  the  two  doors  of  an  old,  pain  ted  frame — 
an  Italian  frame  with  the  gold  and  color  gone  from 
it  in  patches.  From  within,  where  should  have  sat 
a  Madonna  with  her  child,  a  young  woman  sat 
leaning  forward  a  little,  and  smiled.  She  was 
dressed  in  the  manner  of  the  early  seventies. 

Robert  Henley  stood  gazing  into  the  face  of  the 
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pictured  woman,  his  gray  head  bent  forward,  his 
hands  clasped  oddly  before  him.  He  looked  like 
one  who  prayed.  After  a  little  he  spoke  a  name 
in  a  whispered  tone.  And  then  he  said: 

"She  was — David's  mother." 

Violet  gave  a  sudden  cry,  and  she  looked  from 
the  bowed  old  man  to  the  woman  who  smiled  from 
the  picture  frame,  and  so  understood. 

"All  these  years?"  she  murmured,  wonderingly. 
Strangely  enough  the  thing  brought  to  her  mind 
those  early  discussions  of  hers  with  David,  when 
David  had  so  stoutly  maintained  that  faithfulness 
such  as  this  still  existed  in  the  world,  and  she  had 
not  believed  him.  It  seemed  that  David  was 
right. 

"All  these,"  said  Robert  Henley,  not  turning  his 
head,  "and  as  many  more  years  as  may  be  left  to 
me." 

He  closed  the  panels  of  the  Italian  frame  very 
softly,  and  pulled  down  the  window-blind  to  shut 
out  the  sunlight  from  that  dim  and  sheeted  place. 
Then  the  two  went  back  through  the  hallway  to 
the  other  room. 

"There  is  one  thing,"  said  the  man,  "that  I 
should  like  you  to  know.  It  has  to  do  with  David's 
income.  His  father  left  him  very  little — almost 
nothing — " 

Violet  gave  another  exclamation. 

"But  he  has  three  thousand  a  year!"  she  said. 
"He  told  me  so;  three  thousand  from  his  patri 
mony." 

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Old  Robert  looked  up  a  bit  sheepishly,  like  one 
caught  in  mischief. 

"It  seemed  the  only  way,"  said  he.  "It  spared 
David's  pride  and  gave  him  enough  money  to  live 
on.  I  should  gladly  have  given  him  more  if  I  had 
dared.  I  was  afraid  he  would  suspect  me.  Of 
course  all  I  have  is  to  go  to  him  at  my  death." 

"Then,"  said  she,  "you  have  supported  David 
almost  all  his  life?  You  have  done  that?" 

"You  don't  begrudge  me  the  pleasure  I  have 
taken  from  so  little  a  thing?"  he  answered.  "You 
wouldn't  rob  me  of  that?" 

She  shook  her  head,  looking  at  him  under  her 
brows,  dumbly. 

"And  you  won't  tell  David?"  he  begged.  "I 
don't  want  David  ever  to  know.  He  understands 
almost  nothing  of  business  matters,  and  he  need 
never  know." 

She  shook  her  head  again.  "Oh,  I  won't  tell 
him,"  said  she;  "it  would  hurt  his  pride.  But  it 
would  also  make  him  very,  very  grateful  to  you. 
You  don't  want  even  that?" 

"No,"  said  old  Robert,  "not  at  the  expense  of 
his  pride.  I  want  nothing,  save  David's  welfare. 
None  of  us  wants  anything  but  that,  I  think." 

"I  wonder,"  said  David's  wife. 

She  fell  into  a  frowning  silence,  but  at  its  end 
looked  up  with  something  oddly  defiant  in  her 
eyes. 

"  It  would  be  a  great  pity,  wouldn't  it,"  she  said, 
as  she  had  said  once  before,  "to  disturb  him  now, 

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to  take  him  away  from  Croydon  just  as  he  is  be 
coming  himself  once  more?" 

The  man  stared  at  her. 

"  And  yet,"  she  went  on,  "  I  am  afraid  I  must  do 
it."  Old  Robert  gave  a  sort  of  contemptuous 
growl. 

"The  thing  is  impossible,"  he  said.  "You  are 
quite  mad."  And  the  woman  flushed  at  his  tone. 

"  I  am  afraid  I  must  do  it,"  she  said  again,  as  if 
he  had  not  spoken,  "for  I  have  to  go  to  New  York 
at  once,  before  the  end  of  this  week,  on  something — 
on  a  very  serious  matter,  and  David,  I  know,  will 
not  let  me  go  alone.  Particularly  when  he  knows, 
as  he  must  know,  how — what  the  matter  is.  He 
said  to  me  last  summer  when  I  came  back  to  him 
from  abroad  that  we  must  never  leave  each  other 
again,  that  he'd  never  let  me  go  away  another  time. 
And  he  meant  it.  I  know  that." 

"There  can  be  no  matter,"  asserted  Robert  Hen 
ley,  coldly,  "more  serious  or  more  important  than 
David's  recovery.  It  is  impossible  that  you  should 
go  away,  if  that  means  that  David  must  go  also." 

"I  have  no  choice,"  she  answered,  "I  must  go." 

But  old  Robert  Henley  struck  his  hands  sharply 
upon  the  top  of  the  great  writing-table  which  stood 
before  him. 

"There  is  always  a  choice!"  he  cried.  "What  if 
there  is  a  sacrifice  to  be  made  ?  Is  sacrifice  beyond 
you  ?  Can  you  not  make  a  sacrifice  as  well  as  other 
people?  Seven  years  ago  Rosemary  Crewe  gave 
David  up  when  she  might  have  kept  him  for  her- 

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self.  She  gave  him  up  forever,  knowing  very  well 
what  she  did,  because  she  thought  it  was  for  his 
good,  as  I  thought.  She  let  him  go  away  from  her 
when  she  might  have  kept  him  here.  Can  you  not 
manage  the  sacrifice  of  whatever  this  trip  to  New 
York  means  to  you?  My  God,  ma'am!"  cried  the 
old  man,  fiercely,  "it  is  time  you  did  something  for 
David's  sake  instead  of  for  your  own.  Have  you 
ever  done  anything  for  him  since  the  very  first?" 

"No,"  said  the  woman,  bending  her  head. 
"No!" 

"You  have  wrecked  and  wellnigh  ruined  him," 
said  he.  "  You  have  brought  him  to  what  he  was 
a  month  ago,  a  ghost  of  David.  It  would  be  in 
finitely  better  for  him  if  you  had  never  been  born, 
for  to-day  and  as  long  as  you  live  you  stand  between 
David  and  the  happiness  God  meant  him  to  have, 
the  happiness  which  would  have  made  him  great. 
And  yet  for  some  whim,  great  or  small,  you  are 
determined  to  drag  him  down  again  when  he  has 
begun  to  climb." 

The  woman  gave  a  little,  tired  sigh. 

"Do  you  think  I  have  forgotten,"  said  she, 
"do  you  think  I  shall  ever  forget,  the  blight  and 
the  millstone  I  have  been  to  David — the  stumbling- 
block  ?  It  is  no  whim  that  takes  me  to  New  York. 
I  must  go.  There  is  nothing  in  this  world  that  I 
would  not  do  for  David,  nothing  great  or  small,  no 
sacrifice  I  would  not  make ;  but — you  don't  under 
stand.  I  must  go,  and  at  once." 

"Why?"  said  the  man. 
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"It  is  a  matter  of  life  and  death,"  she  an 
swered. 

"Whose  life  or  death?"  he  demanded. 

And  she  said:  "Mine." 

Old  Robert  looked  at  her  in  silence  for  a  long 
while,  his  gray  face  hard  and  square,  his  eyebrows 
bristling,  the  pale  eyes,  after  that  way  they  had 
when  he  was  excited,  almost  hidden  under  them. 
And  presently,  when  he  did  not  speak,  the  woman 
went  on: 

"  I  have  known  for  some  months  that  something 
serious  was  wrong  with  me,  but  I  said  nothing 
about  it  to  David  or  to  any  one  else,  because  I  was 
not  quite  sure  that  the  matter  was  what  I  feared. 
But  a  few  days  ago  I  wrote  to  New  York  to  a  cer 
tain  very  famous  physician  who  had  examined  me 
once  in  Nassau,  and  asked  him  to  come  to  Rochester 
and  meet  me  there  at  another  physician's  house. 
I  went  to  Rochester  yesterday,  pretending  that  it 
was  a  shopping  expedition,  and  this  man  examined 
me  again  and  said  that  a  very  serious  operation 
was  necessary  to  save  my  life,  and  that  it  must  be 
immediate.  I  am  to  go  to  a  surgeon  in  New  York 
who  is  a  specialist  in  this  particular  sort  of  thing, 
because  the  physician  who  examined  me  is  not  a 
surgeon  at  all,  and  besides,  he  is  on  his  way  west 
ward  to  Japan.  He  stopped  off  yesterday  only  for 
a  few  hours." 

Old  Robert  frowned  across  at  her  anxiously. 

"  But  why  could  you  not  go  alone  to  New  York  ?" 
he  demanded.  "Say  to  David  that  you  are  going 

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to  make  a  visit  to  your  friends.  Surely  he  will  let 
you  go  alone." 

Violet  shook  her  head. 

"  And  afterwards  ?"  said  she.  "  How  about  after 
wards  ?  Eventually  he  would  have  to  know.  Then, 
if  I  had  died  during  the  operation,  he  would  never 
forgive  himself  for  not  being  with  me ;  and  if  I  came 
through  it  successfully,  he  would  never  forgive  me 
for  not  telling  him."  Her  voice  rose  sharply  in  a 
sort  of  cry.  She  exclaimed :  "  Oh,  believe  me,  there 
is  no  other  way!  Don't  think  I  have  not  tried  to 
find  one.  I  have!  I  have!  All  last  night  I  tried 
very  desperately  to  think  of  a  way,  but  there  is 
none.  I  must  go,  and  I  must  tell  David  why  I  am 
going.  Then  he  will  go,  too,  and  all  this  good  that 
has  come  to  him  here  in  Croydon  will  be  undone. 
It  is  very  bitter  to  me  to  know  that — to  know  that 
I  must  go  on  being  David's  bad  angel,  his  hin 
drance,  his  stumbling-block.  Oh,  you're  quite  right, 
it  would  be  much  better  for  him  if  I  had  never  been 
born,  or  if  I  should  die  during  this  operation.  Per 
haps  I  shall.  You'd  be  glad  of  that,  wouldn't  you  ?" 
She  looked  up  at  the  man  with  a  little  wry  smile, 
but  old  Robert  did  not  smile  back  at  her.  He  sat 
sunken  a  bit  in  his  arm-chair,  his  chin  on  his  breast, 
so  that  the  old-fashioned  coat  was  almost  up  about 
his  ears,  the  keen  eyes  hidden  under  their  bristling 
brows  so  that  there  remained  of  them  only  two 
sharp  gleams  out  of  the  shadow.  But  presently  he 
stirred  a  bit  and  drew  a  long  sigh — the  sigh  of  one 
who  awakes  from  a  dream,  or  of  one  who  resigns 

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something  very  dear  to  him.  It  was  as  if  old 
Robert  surrendered  in  that  sigh;  and  after  it  he 
seemed,  as  it  were,  to  crumple  in  the  depths  of  the 
great  chair  into  a  very  little,  wasted,  outworn  old 
man.  He  raised  his  two  lean  hands  and  dropped 
them  again  feebly  upon  the  arms  of  the  chair. 

"Eh,  poor  David!"  said  he.  The  passion  of  his 
life  held  true  and  absorbed  him  even  to  the  last. 
He  thought  only  of  David,  not  of  the  woman  whose 
life  hung  in  peril.  "It  seems,"  he  went  on,  "as  if 
God  Himself  fought  against  David.  I  wonder  why. 
...  It  is  we  others,"  he  said,  "who  have  been  re 
sponsible.  It  is  we  who  should  suffer,  not  David." 

And  the  woman  answered:  "  I  know,  I  know.  If 
there  were  only  a  way!  But  I  must  go.  If  I  de 
lay  this  thing  ten  days  longer  it  will  be  too  late." 

Robert  Henley  gave  a  sudden  little,  inarticulate 
cry,  and  out  of  those  cavernous  shadows  the  fierce 
old  eyes  gleamed  strangely  for  a  moment.  He  half 
raised  himself  in  the  chair,  but  the  movement  of 
excitement,  whatever  it  may  have  been,  passed, 
and  he  sank  back  again,  head  bowed  and  inert,  the 
claw-like  hands  stirring  feebly  upon  the  chair  arms. 

"What  is  it?"  asked  Violet.  "You  were  going 
to  say  something?"  But  he  shook  his  head  slowly, 
back  and  forth. 

"  It  was  nothing,  nothing!"  he  said,  in  a  querulous 
tone.  "Nothing!" 

He  got  wearily  to  his  feet,  and  at  the  last  some 
belated  sense  of  courtesy,  of  decent  sympathy  due, 
seems  to  have  come  to  him,  but  obviously  a  thin, 

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faint  sense.  His  mind  was  f ull  of  David.  He  said : 
"  I  regret  your  illness,  the  precarious  state  of  your 
health.  I  am  sorry.  Pray,  ma'am,  accept  my 
sympathy.  You  have  suffered  a  great  deal.  I 
hope  the — I  hope  you  will  recover  promptly."  He 
stood  before  her  and  took  her  hand.  His  own  hand 
was  dry  and  cold,  the  woman  found.  "I  think," 
said  he,  "I  think  that  you  love  David,  now,  at 
last?" 

"Yes,"  said  David's  wife.  It  occurred  to  her 
oddly  that  it  was  the  first  time  she  could  in  true 
honesty  have  answered  that  question  so.  She  had 
loved  herself  always.  "Yes,"  she  repeated,  nod 
ding,  "  I  love  him,  at  last.  If  I  had  loved  him  in 
the  beginning  I  suppose  I  would  have  given  him 
up,  like — like  the  other."  She  found  that  she  could 
not  speak  Rosemary  Crewe's  name. 

Old  Robert  looked  up  to  her,  birdlike,  his  head 
on  one  side,  his  eyes  haggard. 

"Then,"  said  he,  "it  may  be  that  even  yet  you 
will  find  a  way,  since  you  love  him." 

"  I  have  thought,"  she  answered,  "  until  my  brain 
is  deadened,  and  there  is  no  way." 

But  the  old  man  peered  up  at  her,  his  face  twisted 
and  white. 

"  It  may  be,"  he  said,  "that  love  will  find  a  way. 
Think  again!" 


CHAPTER  XXVII 

VIOLET  bade   him  good-day  and  went  out  of 
the   house.      His    quaint,    hackneyed    phrase 
said  itself  over  and  over  again  in  her  brain,  and 
would  not  be  stilled. 

"  Love  will  find  a  way."  It  was,  she  thought,  the 
burden  of  a  by-gone  song.  "  Love  will  find  a  way. " 
But  what  way,  what  way  ? 

That  odd,  sudden,  momentary  excitement  of 
Robert's  came  before  her,  and  she  wondered  dully 
what  it  could  have  meant.  What  had  she  been 
saying  when  it  seized  him.  She  thought  back  over 
the  scene,  and  suddenly  halted  in  the  act  of  pushing 
open  the  Henley  gate. 

"  If  I  delay  this  thing  ten  days  longer  it  will  be  too 
late."  That  was  what  she  had  said,  and  the  words 
said  themselves  over  to  her,  as  it  were,  aloud.  She 
almost  thought  that  an  actual  voice  repeated  them. 

She  pushed  open  the  gate  and  went  slowly  home 
ward.  David  was  not  in  sight,  and  she  went  up  to 
her  own  room  and  locked  herself  in. 

"  If  I  delay  this  thing  ten  days  longer  it  will  be 
too  late."     She  said  the  words  herself  this  time, 
and  aloud.     Then  the  burden  of  that  old,  forgotten 
song  began  again  to  repeat  itself, 
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"  Love  will  find  a  way, 
Love  will  find  a  way." 

It  was  her  great  moment,  the  supreme  moment 
of  her  life,  and  she  knew  it.  She  stood  alone  and 
on  high,  far  above  the  petty  calls  of  the  flesh,  ad 
ministrator  and  executrix  of  fates.  David's  fate 
lay  in  the  hollow  of  her  hands,  and  her  own  fate, 
and  Rosemary  Crewe's. 

And  more  lay  there:  It  was  for  her  to  decide 
whether  David,  the  artist,  the  creator,  should  give 
out  to  the  world  of  that  richness  God  had  put  into 
him,  or  should  creep  through  the  remainder  of  his 
life  dumb,  silent,  unfruitful. 

Up  to  that  mountain  top  whereon  she  stood 
seems  to  have  breathed  a  little  puff  of  wind  bear 
ing  with  it  a  thin,  faint  echo  of  the  sweetness  of 
mortality,  for  she  wrung  her  hands  before  her,  and 
was  wrung  by  a  sudden  fit  of  shuddering.  Her  lips 
said,  voicelessly,  and  as  if  out  of  old  habit:  "  I  want 
to  live.  I  cannot  do  it.  I  want  to  live."  But  the 
fit  of  shuddering  died  away,  and  the  words  died 
away  with  it,  leaving  her  calm  again,  again  adminis 
trator  and  executrix  of  fates. 

She  found  herself  speaking — arguing  the  matter, 
as  it  were,  aloud.  "In  all  my  life,"  she  said,  "I 
have  never  done  one  strong,  unselfish  thing.  I 
have  never  made  a  great  sacrifice  for  any  living 
soul.  As  lives  go,  my  life  seems  to  me  to  have 
been  a  tragic  failure.  No  one  has  been  better  for 
it,  but  several  people  have  been  worse — have  suf- 

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fered  because  I  was  alive.  .  .  .  That  is  because  I 
have  loved  only  myself.  What  of  the  future?" 

She  looked  ahead  down  the  probable  span  of 
years,  gray  years,  full  of  emptiness  and  full  of  physi 
cal  suffering.  The  fact  that  she  had  at  last  come 
to  love  her  husband  was  not  proof  or  even  indica 
tion  that  their  life  was  to  be  changed  into  a  happy 
life.  Love  made  her  clear-eyed,  and  she  saw  clearly. 
She  could  never  be  aught  but  a  stumbling-block  to 
him,  a  millstone  round  his  neck.  That  was  certain. 
Remained,  then — what? 

In  the  shadows  at  the  far  end  of  the  room  an 
accusing,  commanding  figure  seemed  to  sit,  hud 
dled  in  a  great  chair,  baleful-eyed,  white,  and  stern. 
And  the  figure  seemed  to  say : 

"  You  have  done  nothing  but  ill  in  all  your  life. 
Now  do  well!  Set  David  free!" 

She  looked  into  the  shadows  calmly,  without  fear. 
And  she  said:  "  Is  it  for  the  best?" 

But  the  figure  there  said,  very  sternly:  "You 
know  it  is  for  the  best." 

The  woman  bowed  her  head,  saying:  "Yes,  I 
know  —  I  will  set  him  free.  Perhaps  that  will 
make  up  to  him  some  of  the  harm  I  have  done. 
And" — she  repeated  the  words — "I  will  set  him 
free." 

Her  thoughts  turned  to  ways  and  means.  She 
was  essentially  a  practical  woman,  and  she  knew 
herself  rather  well.  She  realized  that  in  this  hour 
she  stood  upon  a  spiritual  mountain  peak,  untram 
melled  by  the  flesh,  in  a  pure  fervor  of  renunciation ; 

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but  she  realized  also  that  the  mood  could  not  endure 
—that  to-morrow  might  bring  an  entire  reversal, 
and  it  was  therefore  necessary  in  some  way  to  clinch 
the  decision  within  the  hour — somehow  to  commit 
herself  beyond  retreat. 

She  stood  thinking  for  a  little,  and  at  last  went 
to  her  writing-table  and  took  paper  and  pen.  She 
wrote  a  very  brief  note  to  Robert  Henley.  The 
words  were  trivial,  meaningless  to  any  one  but  old 
Robert;  but  he  would  understand.  She  wrote: 

"DEAR  MR.  HENLEY,  —  I  said  something  to  you  this 
morning  about  an  immediate  journey  to  New  York.  On 
second  thought  I  have  decided  to  remain  here  in  Croydon 
for  another  fortnight.  VIOLET  RIVERS." 

Old  Robert  would  understand  that.  It  stood, 
in  a  way,  a  pledge  to  him.  In  it  she  gave  her  word 
and  she  would  not  break  it.  She  rang  for  her  maid, 
and  when  the  woman  came  gave  her  the  note,  tell 
ing  her  to  take  it  at  once  to  Mr.  Henley  and  see  that 
it  was  put  into  his  own  hands. 

Afterwards  she  stood  at  a  window  and  watched 
the  woman  go — and  return.  She  took  a  great 
breath  and  turned  back  into  the  room.  She  mur 
mured  : 

"  At  last  I  have  done  a  good  thing  and  I  am  glad, 
glad."  She  was  mildly  astonished  to  find  that  she 
truly  was  glad.  The  decision  made,  and  her  word 
given,  a  great  load  of  responsibility  and  weakness 
and  despair  seemed  to  have  dropped  from  her. 
She  felt  no  regret,  only  a  great  buoyancy  which 

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would  have  been  joyous  had  it  not  rather  been 
solemn. 

"  People  who  have  come  out  of  long  suffering  into 
a  final  peace  through  religion  must  feel  so,"  she 
said,  a  little  wonderingly.  She  had  seen  the  out 
ward  manifestations  of  religious  exaltation  more 
than  once,  and  had  been  a  little  scornful  of  it,  as 
people  of  her  temperament  usually  are;  but  she 
realized  now  that  her  own  state  was  that  of  exalta 
tion — an  odd  freedom  from  all  the  things  of  the 
flesh,  and  she  was  glad. 

''I  am  very,  very  tired  of  living,"  she  said,  and 
the  rather  theatrical  phrase  was  robbed  of  its 
cheapness  by  the  quiet  honesty  with  which  she 
spoke  it,  by  the  entire  lack  of  pose  or  passion. 

There  came  a  knocking  at  the  door,  and  David's 
voice  asking  if  he  might  come  in.  She  answered : 

"Yes,  of  course,"  and  he  entered  and  closed  the 
door  behind  him. 

He  crossed  the  room  to  her  and  kissed  her,  for 
the  two  had  not  met  that  morning,  David  having 
left  the  house  before  his  wife  was  dressed.  It 
seemed  to  her  that  he  was  paler  than  usual,  and 
that  his  eyes  had  a  troubled  look;  she  would  have 
called  it  half -frightened  if  that  had  not  been  rather 
absurd.  She  asked  him  if  he  had  had  a  good  run 
to  Caledonia,  and  he  shook  his  head. 

"We  didn't  get  there  at  all,"  he  said.  "Some 
thing  happened  to  the  car,  and  we  had  to  leave  it 
at  a  farm-house  and  drive  back.  I've  been  at — the 

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Crewes'  for  an  hour  or  so."  He  made  as  if  he  would 
speak  further,  and  then  seemed  to  change  his  mind ; 
for  he  crossed  to  one  of  the  windows  and  stood  there 
a  little  time  staring  out  into  the  green-arched  street. 
Presently  he  said:  "Oh,  there  was  something  you 
wanted  to  say  to  me.  You  said  last  night  that  you 
wanted  to  talk  something  over,  didn't  you?" 

"Yes,"  replied  Violet,  slowly.  "Yes,  I  did  want 
to  speak  to  you  about  something.  David,  I've  got 
to  go  to  New  York  for  a  while — not  now,  but  in  a 
fortnight.  I  need  something  done  to  me,  I  think, 
some  medical  care,  you  know.  Oh  no!"  as  David 
burst  out  in  alarmed  questionings.  "  No,  it's  noth 
ing  serious,  nothing  at  all  serious ;  but  to  save  future 
trouble  it  ought  to  be  attended  to." 

"Of  course!"  said  David.  "We  will  go  at  once, 
at  once!  We  mustn't  take  chances." 

But  she  shook  her  head,  saying:  "No,  I  don't 
want  to  go  at  once.  I  want  to  stay  here  for  a  few 
days  longer  and  rest.  I 'm  not  feeling  up  to  the  jour 
ney  just  now.  I'm  rather  tired  out.  I  shall  be 
very  lazy  and  play  that  I'm  a  sort  of  invalid  for  a 
fortnight,  and  by  that  time  I  shall  be  quite  right 
again,  and  we'll  go.  I'm  sorry  about  it  all,  David. 
I'm  more  sorry  than  I  can  say  to  drag  you  away 
from  here,  where  you're  so  well  and  so  happy." 

But  David  faced  her  with  honest,  troubled  eyes. 

"I  shall  be  glad  to  go,"  he  said.  "It's  better 
that  I  should  go,  only  I  wish  it  might  be  to-mor 
row.  I  was  going  to  speak  of  it  to  you,"  said  he, 
"before  you  said  anything  yourself  about  leaving 

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Croydon.  I  was  going  to  ask  you  if  you'd  mind 
going  away." 

The  mood  of  exaltation  was  still  upon  her,  that 
high  aloofness  from  all  the  things  of  the  flesh.  She 
understood  that  something  had  happened  to  open 
David's  eyes,  to  show  him  where  his  charmed  feet 
were  tending ;  but  it  waked  in  her  no  slightest  pang 
of  the  old  jealousy,  only  a  sort  of  pity.  She  put 
out  her  hand  and  touched  his  cheek,  and  she  smiled 
upon  him  gravely.  There  was  something  maternal 
in  both  smile  and  gesture.  She  answered: 

"Poor,  dear  David!  I  know,  /  know!  In  a 
fortnight  or  ten  days  we'll  leave  for  New  York. 
You  can  spend  the  interval  in  work,  can't  you, 
David?" 


CHAPTER  XXVIII 

THEY  left  Croydon  at  the  end  of  a  fortnight, 
as  Violet  had  wished  to  do.  She  spent  the 
intervening  days  in  her  own  room,  solitary,  avoid 
ing  even  David's  presence  as  much  as  possible. 
The  progress  of  her  malady  was  not  painful,  but  her 
bodily  strength  ebbed  slowly  day  by  day,  and  a 
torpor  grew  upon  her  in  which  she  slept  a  great 
deal.  Much  to  her  surprise  the  spiritual  exaltation 
in  which  she  had  come  to  her  great  decision  did  not 
fade  as  she  had  expected,  but  remained  always  with 
her;  or  perhaps  it  may  be  more  accurately  true  to 
say  that  its  results  remained,  that  the  bodily  torpor 
which  enwrapped  her  brought  with  it  a  torpor  of 
mind  also,  in  which  life  and  the  things  of  this  world 
seemed  very  heavy  and  troublesome,  full  of  weari 
ness  and  by  no  means  to  be  desired.  Renunciation 
no  longer  demanded  effort.  It  was  so  much  trouble 
to  live! 

David  attempted  to  work,  but  the  spur  had 
gone.  He  was  worried  somewhat  over  Violet's 
condition,  though  she  had  assured  him  that  there 
was  nothing  seriously  wrong,  and  he  was  troubled 
over  another  matter.  Violet  had  been  right  in 
thinking  that  something  had  happened  to  open 

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his  eyes,  to  show  him  whither  he  was  drifting. 
Something  had  happened.  The  two,  Rosemary 
and  he,  had  come  unthinking,  heedless  of  danger, 
suddenly  to  the  brink  of  an  abyss,  and  their  eyes 
had  dropped  from  the  far  clouds  to  the  depths 
before  them  and  they  had  seen,  and  shrunk  back 
speechless  with  horror.  It  was  the  inevitable  end 
to  that  enchanted  forgetfulness. 

Thereafter  David  saw  the  girl  but  once  before  his 
departure.  They  met  in  the  street  and  there  was 
no  one  near.  He  said,  at  once: 

"  I  am  going  away,  Rose-Marie.  We  are  leaving 
Croydon  next  week,  on  Friday." 

And  Rosemary's  beautiful  face  went  white,  but 
her  eyes  met  his  eyes  unfaltering,  and  she  nodded 
her  head. 

"Yes,  Davie,"  she  said,  gravely.  "Yes,  that  is 
the  only  thing  to  do." 

She  was  silent  for  a  moment,  but  in  the  moment 
something  flashed  very  suddenly  across  her  face, 
and  David  gave  a  cry.  It  was  the  first  time  he  had 
ever  seen  frank  agony  in  her  eyes,  and  it  sent  a  great 
surge  of  intolerable  pain  over  him,  a  wave  of  some 
thing  like  physical  sickness.  The  look  passed  like 
a  flash,  however,  as  it  had  come,  and  Rosemary 
was  calm  once  more.  She  said : 

"Listen,  Davie!  There  is  no  good  of  any  pre 
tence  between  you  and  me.  We  cannot  pretend 
that  we  are  not  very  dear  each  to  the  other.  Only 
we've  been  drifting  and  we  didn't  realize  it  until 
suddenly,  the  other  day.  So  I  think  you  must  go, 

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for  a  time,  anyhow.  But  oh,  Davie!  don't  think 
I'm  ashamed,  for  I'm  not.  I'm  proud,  proud  of  it 
all.  What  I  give  to  you  I  take  from  no  one.  It 
is  mine  to  give  as  freely  as  I  choose.  And  what 
you  give  me  you  also  take  from  no  one.  It's  dif 
ferent  from  the  sort  of  love  that  any  one  else  has 
any  right  to  expect  from  you.  What  you  give  to 
me,  Davie,  you  have  made  no  pretence  of  giving 
elsewhere.  Is  not  that  true?" 

"Very  true,  Rose-Marie,"  answered  David. 

"  So,"  she  went  on,  "  we  need  feel  no  shame.  But, 
to  prevent  our  love  from  becoming  something  we 
might  have  to  feel  shame  over,  we  must  be  apart 
where  we  cannot  see  each  other's  eyes,  or  know 
how  each  other's  hearts  are  beating.  Oh,  Davie,  I 
want  my  love  to  follow  you  and  be  with  you  always, 
to  comfort  you  and  make  the  world  sweeter  to  you, 
to  be  your  refuge  from  all  trials,  and  to  be  an  in 
spiration  to  you  in  your  work.  I  want  to  rob  no 
one  of  the  littlest  part  of  the  love  you  owe.  I 
want  to  be  to  you  something  quite  different,  some 
thing  in  another  world.  Then,  it  may  be  that, 
after  all,  though  we  must  live  apart,  you  will  be 
able  to  do  your  work  in  peace,  content  and  joy — 
good  work,  great  work,  such  as  you  would  surely 
do  if  you  could  spend  your  days  here  with  me  in 
my  garden.  That's  what  I  meant  to  be  to  you — 
light  and  peace  and  inspiration.  Let  me  be  that 
and  I  shall  be  very,  very  glad  to  have  lived." 

David  bent  over  her  two  hands  and  kissed  them. 

"It  may  be,  Rose-Marie,"  said  he,  "that  what 
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you  and  I  might  have  been  to  each  other  is  too 
much  for  this  world.  There  may  be  other  worlds 
somewhere  beyond  for  that.  I  don't  know.  Mean 
while  I  shall  try  to  live  my  life  and  do  my  work  as 
you  would  have  me  do,  and  I  shall  not  try  to  put 
you  out  of  my  mind  as  I  used  to  try,  but  I  shall  hold 
you  for  my  sun  to  light  me  by  day  and  my  stars  to 
guide  me  by  night;  and  so,  after  all,  we  shall  be 
always  together." 

Then  he  turned  and  went  away  from  her,  and 
Rosemary,  still-eyed,  watched  him  down  the  street 
until  he  was  out  of  sight. 

But  David,  as  he  walked  on  under  the  great 
arch  of  the  maples,  turned  his  eyes  by  chance  to  the 
farther  side,  and  on  the  farther  side  a  bent,  gray 
figure  in  a  rusty  frock-coat  shambled  up  Main 
Street,  its  hands  clasped  under  the  tails  of  the  long 
coat  —  Robert  Henley,  somewhat  more  drunken 
than  usual.  David  drew  back  behind  a  tree  until 
the  old  man  had  reached  his  gate,  and  after  two 
or  three  efforts  had  entered  it,  for  he  knew  that 
Robert  hated  to  be  seen  or  spoken  to  when  in  this 
condition. . 

He  counted  the  days  of  the  week  on  his  fingers 
and  found  that  it  was  Friday — not  a  day  set  apart 
for  drink. 

"I  don't  understand,"  he  said,  with  a  frowning 
head-shake.  "The  old  chap  bucked  up  so  extra 
ordinarily  well  after  we  arrived  here!  I  wonder 
what's  got  into  him." 

And  others  wondered  too — all  but  one;  for  the 
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A   STUMBLING-BLOCK 

old  man  seemed  to  be  embarked  upon  a  protracted 
spree  and  drank  heavily  day  after  day  with  a  sort 
of  grim  hilarity  which  was  quite  contrary  to  his 
silent  custom.  It  was  as  if  he  were  engaged  in  a 
solitary  celebration  of  something  which  demanded 
unusual  efforts.  David  met  him  again,  later  on, 
and  they  spoke  of  his  and  Violet's  impending  de 
parture.  David  talked  rather  vaguely  of  a  possible 
return  later  in  the  year,  and  the  old  man  nodded  at 
him  with  a  half -drunken  gravity,  saying : 

"Ay,  lad;  you'll  come  back,  no  fear!  And  we 
shall  be  waiting — waiting."  He  wept  a  little,  as 
old  men  do,  over  the  prospect  of  the  parting ;  and 
once,  to  David's  astonishment,  he  spoke  very  warm 
ly  of  Violet,  calling  her  a  noble  woman.  It  was  the 
first  good  word  he  had  ever  been  known  to  speak 
of  David's  wife. 

But  Robert  Henley  did  not  appear  at  the  railway 
station  on  the  Sunday  evening  when  David  and 
Violet  took  their  quiet  departure.  He  had  prom 
ised  to  be  there,  but  in  his  place  the  ancient  William 
tip-toed  up  to  David  as  he  stood  beside  the  waiting 
train,  and  whispered  behind  a  huge  hand.  Old 
Robert  was  drunk,  helpless!  Sitting  in  his  study 
with  his  hat  and  stick  on  the  table  beside  him,  and 
babbling  about  not  being  late  at  the  train.  He  was 
too  far  gone  even  to  be  got  into  a  carriage. 

"He'll  be  heart-broken  to-morrow!"  David  said 
to  Violet.  "Absolutely -heartbroken.  Eh!  Poor 
old  Uncle  Robert!" 

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They  had  to  go  as  far  as  Rochester  in  a  way- 
train,  there  to  catch  the  express  for  New  York. 
David  made  his  wife  as  comfortable  as  he  could 
in  a  double  seat,  for  her  head  was  aching;  and 
when  the  train  had  started  and  Violet  lay  back 
with  closed  eyes  very  evidently  not  inclined  for 
speech,  he  went  out  upon  the  rear  platform  of  the 
last  car. 

It  was  dark  and  growing  darker,  a  warm,  sweet 
summer  night,  with  no  moon,  but  a  million  stars, 
soft,  bright  and  near.  There  was  a  little  wind, 
very  gentle,  and  it  was  pungent  of  flowers  and  of 
green  things  growing.  David  looked  across  the 
meadows  to  the  dark  huddle  of  tree  tops,  dotted 
here  and  there  with  pin-points  of  yellow  light, 
which  marked  upper  Main  Street,  the  home  of  his 
youth,  the  house  wherein  sat  a  babbling,  drunken, 
fond  old  man,  the  garden  of  peace  and  enchant 
ment,  the  square  white  house  where  Rosemary 
dwelt. 

He  pictured  her  there,  tall,  slim,  virginal,  with 
loving  eyes.  He  knew  that  she  was  already  turning 
to  the  sweet  and  gentle  life  his  arrival  had  inter 
rupted.  He  saw  her  going  about  it,  brave  and  un- 
repining,  infinitely  glad  of  the  solace  she  had 
brought  him,  asking  no  more,  desiring  no  more, 
though  she  loved  him  beyond  the  bounds  of  all 
imagination. 

And  he  said  to  himself  that  there  was  a  nobility 
of  soul  so  pure,  and  so  true,  that  it  must  surely 
shame  him,  in  those  weary  days  to  come  when  there 

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would  be  black  hours  of  weakness  and  despair,  into 
some  sort  of  bravery  like  its  beautiful  self. 

But  as  he  stood  there  gazing,  high  up  in  a  velvet 
sky  over  Rosemary's  garden  a  star  fell  and  shot 
across  the  darkness,  leaving  a  yellow  trail  of  fire. 
Then  another  star,  and  a  third. 

Three  falling  stars.  Dim,  half -formed  memories 
vaguely  stirred  in  him.  Three  falling  stars.  What 
did  three  falling  stars  mean?  Very  vaguely  still, 
he  found  that  he  connected  them  with  the  eve  of 
great  happenings  in  his  life,  great  changes,  epochs. 
So  they  must  have  appeared  to  him  before.  He 
shook  his  head  a  bit  wearily,  for  he  could  not  re 
member.  He  sent  one  last  glance  towards  that 
far  darkness  where  the  trees  of  Croydon  huddled 
together,  and  then  turned  quietly  to  go  back  into 
the  car  where  he  had  left  his  wife. 


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